Metis Gilera pair hoping for the best in Valencia

Metis Gilera rider Roberto Locatelli will undergo surgery on Wednesday morning, after his crash on lap five of the 250cc Shell Advance Malaysian Motorcycle Grand Prix resulted in a fractured right scaphoid.

Locatelli and Karel Abraham were involved in a coming together early on in Malaysia, with the 35 year-old former 125cc World Champion injuring his right wrist.

Advice from team-mate Simoncelli – who missed the first race of the season at Losail with an identical injury and was not competitive until the third event at Jerez – has led Locatelli to Doctor Soragni in San Marino, who will operate on the rider alongside Doctor Claudio Costa of the Clinica Mobile.

Locatelli is optimistic of racing at Valencia in the final race of the season on November 8th, where team-mate Simoncelli still has the very faintest of hopes of defending his 250cc World title. His third-placed finish at Sepang, behind Hiroshi Aoyama and Héctor Barberá, mean that at 21 points adrift of the Scot Honda man, the chances are extremely slim however.

“I’m quite happy with the race I rode, because I gave my whole self, and I couldn’t do more than that,” said Simoncelli, after an epic battle with Aoyama in Malaysia. “I’m not happy in terms of the championship because now it’s probably impossible to win.”

“I enjoyed the race, but I’m sorry because I hoped to finish second. Barberá set the fastest lap of the race though and won the battle for second. If I don’t win the championship this year, I didn’t lose it today, but during the season with the little bits of bad luck I had and through my mistakes.”