Stoner, Pedrosa, Lorenzo, Rossi, Bautista attend Estoril presser – 2011 MotoGP season
Casey Stoner and Dani Pedrosa of Repsol Honda, Jorge Lorenzo of Yamaha Factory, Valentino Rossi of Ducati team and Alvaro Bautista of Rizla Suzuki were present at the press meeting held at the Estoril circuit, prior to the bwin Gran Premio de Portugal.
The season is coming alive in Estoril this weekend on May 1, 2011 with the third event of the 2011 MotoGP calendar. The season had to face an unobvious long inter-event break due to the postponement of the Japanese Grand Prix due to a devastating earthquake
and tsunami in the country.
All the MotoGP star riders are reuniting for the event and practicing with their teams for the victory. Some unfortunate riders who had accidents in past two rounds of the season are now promising to be in shape for the race day.
Jorge Lorenzo is in pursuit to continue his victorious streak for a second consecutive round of the season and fourth for his fourth start at the venue.
The Defending world champion was first to speak about the third event. He said, “It’s a track I love. I’ve won three times here and took my first MotoGP win here too. But this year is different, in theory it’s a tough year for us. We are leading the Championship
because we have had two fabulous races, but now the circumstances are different and it’s a different year.”
Lorenzo and his teammate Ben Spies will be also running at the official factory test to get the 2011 M1 in a better shape. The test will be done on Monday, May 2, 2011 just after the race day.
Repsol Honda rider Casey Stoner said, “I’ve always been fast here, the last few years haven’t gone the best, but in general we’ve been quite competitive here and this year with the Honda it should be easier. All we need to do now is accumulate points and
get our Championship on track.”
Stoner is eager to get back his points after the accident he faced due to Valentino Rossi on a wet Jerez track. The Aussie is fast on his RC212V as he dominated the pre-season testing sessions at Sepang and Qatar.
The Repsol teammate Dani Pedrosa availed the long gap between races by undergoing a surgery on his left shoulder to fix his arm pump issues. Pedrosa felt lack of strength and numbness during the mid season test sessions and it continued in the same manner
in the first round of the 2011 MotoGP season. His surgery was done just after the second round at Spain.
Dani Pedrosa explained his views at the meeting, “It’s still a bit sore and stiff, but I hope I can test it here, get a good feeling and see if I can improve.”
The Spaniard rider has finished three times on the podium at Estoril in his premier class career.
The sole rider of Rizla Suzuki Alvaro Bautista made his return from the Qatar crash where he got his left femur fractured and underwent a series of surgeries to get back in racing leathers. Let’s see how he fares in the upcoming event.
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