Hopkins wants podiums after positive Portuguese race

In the top five for the first time this year at Estoril, Kawasaki´s John Hopkins bettered his race position from the 2007 race in the bwin.com Grande Premio de Portugal.

The Anglo-American took advantage of a pair of falls ahead of him, from Andrea Dovizioso and Nicky Hayden, but the hard work at the start of the race was all his own. Hopkins was pleased with the result, but still has his eye on rostrum finishes for `Team Green´.

`I came to Kawasaki for podiums. We´re playing catch-up at the moment, but the development is going good and I´m doing the best I can for the engineers who are working so hard,´said Hopkins, who recently tested the factory´s new screamer engine.

`We got off to a great start, and I really tried to keep up with the guys at the front. Then it was just a case of trying to hang onto Colin (Edwards) and Nicky (Hayden). I made a small mistake and unfortunately they ended up getting by me.

`From there it was a case of fighting against the clock with Casey (Stoner), because at the end he was making some really good lap times. We wanted a top five; unfortunately a couple of people had to fall off for us to get that, but it´s another positive result.´