De Angelis plays down role in Capirossi collision

Alex de Angelis has played down his role in the crash that ended both he and Loris Capirossi´s Gran Premi Cinzano de Catalunya, one for which he was on the receiving end of criticism from Rizla Suzuki boss Paul Denning. The Gresini team had little to celebrate on the occasion of their 200th Grand Prix, with Shinya Nakano also dissatisfied with ninth place and ironically bemoaning a lack of aggression.

Alex de Angelis - DNF

`I´m disappointed with the way the race has finished today. I was making up positions after a bad start and had closed in on Capirossi. Loris went too deep into the first corner and ran a little wide, so I tried to get up the inside of him. Unfortunately he closed the door on the exit of the corner and we hit each other and crashed. It´s a shame because I think today was a race where we could have picked up some important points. Despite that, in general it has been a good weekend´

Shinya Nakano - Ninth

`Yet another difficult race and I cannot be satisfied with it, despite coming out of it with some decent points and a good lap time. It was clear the result wasn´t going to be much better from the opening laps, when the riders immediately in front of me quickly began to escape. We clearly need something to help us towards better results and I think the answer could like in changing some aspects of the bike set-up so that it is more suited to my style of riding. I need to be able to ride with more aggression so that I can be fast from the opening laps and stay in touch with the riders in front..´