Injured Hopkins fights for the top ten

After injuring his back on Friday John Hopkins rode bravely in Sunday´s Gran Premi Cinzano de Catalunya race to bring his Kawasaki Ninja ZX-RR home in tenth position.

His teammate Anthony West, who set his fastest lap of the entire weekend in the opening stages, endured a hard, race long fight with Marco Melandri to finish in a points-scoring twelfth position.

John Hopkins – tenth

`I´m in a lot of pain right now with my injury and that was a really hard race. I tried to pass a few people at the start, but I got boxed out and I lost some ground. I pushed as hard as I could to stay with the group ahead of me, but the pain set in and I had to really focus on settling into a rhythm. It was then a case of finding a way to ride without moving around too much on the machine to finish the race, and although tenth isn´t where I want to be, in this situation I´m pleased we managed to achieve that. We still have a lot of work to do with the bike, and hopefully we can be in a good condition for the next race in Britain.´

Anthony West - Twelfth

`I rode as hard as I possibly could today and I fought hard with Marco for the entire race. I passed him into the turns on many occasions, but his machine was a bit stronger on the straights and it just meant I had a lot of work to do each time he came by. The tyre went off a little in the last few laps, which meant I just didn´t quite have enough to re-take him before the finish. I´m happy we had a good race, but we still need to make big improvements to the set-up of the bike. I´m going to Japan for a test where I hope we can try to resolve the rear traction issues I´ve been suffering, then we´ll be back in Europe preparing for Donington Park and, hopefully, we can make another step forwards there.´