Biaggi dedicates win to Cobas

Max Biaggi dedicated his first victory of the season to Antonio Cobas, the revered technician who spent one season working alongside the Italian rider in the Camel Honda team run by Sito Pons.

The weekend could not have gone better for Biaggi, who set pole position and planned a perfect race to seal victory and second place in the championship, one point behind leader Valentino Rossi, after Sete Gibernau crashed out.

"This weekend has been fantastic, my Honda was brilliant and this race is so much important for us all, it is the result of the good job made with the team, Honda and Michelin," revealed an ecstatic Biaggi after the race. "We closed the gap in the championship classification and we are preparing for a second part of the season that will be really tough.

"That's why we have to keep our feet on the ground and keep on working as we did until now. This RC211V has even more margin for improvement. In the warm-up we worked on the suspensions settings in order to prepare the second half of the race, the part I cared about the most.

"In fact, when Valentino passed me with 14 laps to go I kept clam, waiting for my moment. When I saw he was slowing down I overtook him and I concentrated on keeping my rhythm. Thirty laps of this narrow and twisty track are never ending – there is no a proper straight where you can relax a bit between a corner and the following one, and this is quite a stress.

"Anyway I stayed focused and when Barros came close I didn't let him pass. Losing such a race in the last corner would have been terrible. I wish to dedicate this success to Antonio Cobas, a fantastic technician and a fantastic person who I shared the pit box with for one year. It has been a while that I wanted to do this but I didn't have chance. For him I wanted a victory."