TEAM SUZUKI MOTOGP ON THE PACE AS HOPKINS BATTLES THROUGH THE PAIN BARRIER
30 July 2005 - Suzuki Racing

Team SUZUKI MotoGP racers Kenny Roberts Jr and John Hopkins both qualified for tomorrow’s Alice Motorrad Grand Prix Deutschland within touching distance of pole position, following this afternoon’s exciting session at Sachsenring in Germany.

Hopkins (P10, 1’23.296) performed bravely to fight off the injuries that he suffered during yesterday’s high-speed crash and for a long period of the qualifying practice he was in second place – just behind team-mate Roberts Jr. Hopkins will now have further treatment this evening to help in his fight for fitness for tomorrow’s race.

Roberts Jr (P9, 1’23.212) continued his good form and topped the qualifying leader-board for over half of the hour-long session. His fastest time was only 0.427 seconds behind pole-setter Nicky Hayden.

Today’s practice sessions were held in much cooler conditions than yesterday with temperatures only reaching 24 degrees. Sunday’s race will begin at the earlier time of 12.30CET, with the chance of thunderstorms still very likely.

Kenny Roberts Jr:

“I think we’re ok as far as race grip goes. We would still like some things to happen with the bike that would help us with the lap-time on race tyres and race set-up. Qualifying times don’t mean that much to me – as they haven’t done all year. As far as where we are on the grid, I think that in a dry race we have to make the bike a bit more competitive to achieve what we want to achieve and that is to run up at the front with the top group, and to be able to slide the bike around and still have a competitive lap-time.”

Dean Miller – Team Physio:

“John’s injuries have made it a bit difficult for him to step-up and do exactly what he would want to do if he was healthy. He took the job out there today very seriously and did what he had to do. We will continue to work on things and give him some pain relief and get him ready to race.”

Paul Denning – Team Manager:

“A truly heroic effort by John. He is struggling to get on and off the bike and there are definitely some strength issues with him riding. He’s passed his medical but his list of injuries include a broken bone in his foot, sprained ligaments in his hand, cartilage damage in his ribs and severe bruising all over. Maybe riding the bike at that speed for one lap is possible but 30 laps is a different matter entirely – we will have to wait and see how he is tomorrow. A night’s rest should be a big benefit but sometimes in these situations it can make things worse. Let’s hope for the positive and that he is able to ride well and safely tomorrow. If he can score some points it will be a richly deserved reward.

“It was great to see Kenny setting the pace for the majority of the session. Indeed with only a few minutes to go the GSV-R’s were one and two. The position changed a bit towards the end and Kenny tried to respond but his last two runs didn’t go as smoothly as his earlier ones and he wasn’t able to improve on his lap-time. Nonetheless to be only 0.4 seconds off pole - and with rapidly improving options for race tyres from Bridgestone - indicates that whilst in the dry we will probably not be where we would like to be, the direction in terms of ultimately getting better results seems to be well underway.”

Alice Motorrad Grand Prix Deutschland Qualifying Practice Classification:

1. Nicky Hayden (Honda) 1’22.785: 2 Sete Gibernau (Honda) +0.104: 3. Alex Barros (Honda) +0.147: 4. Valentino Rossi (Yamaha) +0.188: 5. Marco Melandri (Honda) +0.266: 6. Max Biaggi (Honda) +0.269: 7. Colin Edwards (Yamaha) +0.354: 8. Loris Capirossi (Ducati) +0.389: 9. KENNY ROBERTS JR (TEAM SUZUKI MOTOGP) +0.427: 10. JOHN HOPKINS (TEAM SUZUKI MOTOGP) +0.511:

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