Not for the first time this season, Jorge “Mad George” Lorenzo has parted company with his Yamaha in a big way.
At Sunday’s US MotoGP, he was bucked off his bike on the high side - one of the worst types of crash for a rider - and ended up in the gravel trap.Lorenzo broke a couple of bones in his left foot in the incident, and now faces a race to be fit for the next GP, at Brno next month.
This is Mad George’s third major injury of the season: he fractured his right leg and both ankles in a spectacular crash in China in May, and suffered concussion and a hand injury in a practice crash at Barcelona in June.
1. All of the grid girls were called Alice. Apparently.
2. Valentino Rossi’s brilliantly eye-catching helmet put off all of his rivals, as we suspected it might. Not that we’d ascribe Rossi’s victory to his helmet alone, but it sure helped.
Italian legend to wear helmet decorated with his own face
Is this the most brilliant helmet in the history of motorsport? The short answer is yes, it mos’ definitely is. Rossi will wear the special-edition Aldo Drudi helmet, which sports a disturbingly, distractingly large image of his own excited face, in tomorrow’s Italian MotoGP. We hope it catches on in F1 - would make races much more exciting.
1. Valentino Rossi The Doctor is back again, after a seven-race winless streak - ah, we never doubted him. The Italian maestro hardly put a wheel wrong in Shanghai, and is deservedly the new bookies’ favourite for the title. Great to see him back on the podium’s top step.
2. & 3. Charlie Cox & Steve Parrish The BBC’s MotoGP first-class commentary duo continue to entertain, inform and excite – they complement each other so well. We’d like to see them involved somehow in the Beeb’s F1 coverage next season.
This could have been, so much worse, had Lorenzo landed on his neck or head. As we reported in the post above, he was very lucky to escaped with a chipped ankle bone and bruising.
Valentino Rossi, who is Lorenzo’s team-mate at Yamaha, didn’t like what he saw from the garage: “Mama mia, I have to ride that thing too?” That said, Lorenzo is on Michelin tyres, whilst Rossi uses Bridgestone – and this incident looked like it might have been tyre-related.
MotoGP championship co-leader breaks ankle, doubtful for Sunday
Shanghai, China: Ouch, that’s gonna hurt in the morning. This great photo shows Jorge Lorenzo parting company with his Yamaha during the first practice session for this Sunday’s China MotoGP. The 20-year-old Spaniard, currently riding high in the Grid Crasher Power Rankings, fractured a bone in his left ankle and suffered severe trauma and bruising to parts of his right ankle and foot as a result of the high-side accident, which occurred at the exit of the first corner.
Spanish prodigy wins maiden MotoGP in Portugal, and other scorchingly hot news
Move over Valentino Rossi, there’s a new genius in leathers. Jorge Lorenzo won his first senior MotoGP race, at Estoril on Sunday. It was only his third grand prix. The Spaniard now leads the championship, alongside compatriot Dani Pedrosa. As you can see from the photo above, young Jorge’s not afraid to spray his victory champagne prematurely, and all over a hotpants-wearing grid girl. Not the hair! This kid will go far. Crash.net has a more detailed race report.
Motorcycylists have larger testicles than F1 drivers
Here’s a clip of Texan MotoGP rider Colin Edwards somehow managing not to crash his Tech 3 Yamaha in qualifying for the recent Spanish GP at Jerez, and then showboating to the crowd about it (and watch him being interviewed about the incident):
Compare Edwards’s remarkable save with a similar escape from Randy Mamola, after the link below…
