Gresini duo take four points and a lesson to Jerez

Licking their wounds after a race weekend that did not go entirely to plan, San Carlo Gresini Honda nonetheless took a combined four points from Japan. Team Manager Fausto Gresini described the Sunday battle as ‘a lesson learnt’, whilst his riders were a little less charitable about their performances.

“We had some problems on Friday and missed our only opportunity to get the bike set up for dry conditions, which was an unfortunate circumstance that we paid the price for today,” lamented Alex de Angelis –the highest placing rider from the satellite team in thirteenth position. “I went for a hard front and rear tyre but it clearly didn’t work with the set-up we had and I had no feeling from the tyres or the suspension. Three points isn’t much but it’s better than nothing.”

If De Angelis was putting the disaster down to a bad tyre choice, Toni Elías was taking even more of the blame on his own shoulders. Desperate for a good result, the Spaniard dropped his RC212V with just a handful of laps gone, and was furious with himself for the mistake.

“I’m very disappointed. I was struggling a little over the opening couple of laps but by lap three I started to feel good and I was able to start making up positions. I caught the group that Melandri and Vermeulen were in but just when I had done all the hard work I had a stupid crash. I got on the dirty part on the outside of the track and lost grip on the front and rear under braking. That’s the most disappointing thing because I had the opportunity to pick up some important points and I threw it away.”

Elías and De Angelis will now aim to rectify the situation at the Spanish round of the World Championship this weekend, a home race for the former.