anyone getting excited for MOTOGP at Indy?

[minira]

I can't wait for the weekend when they're in Indy. I wonder how it's going to go down. think rossi and stoner will go at it again? would love to see a battle like that again, unless stoner suddenly loses grip and low sides again. i hate stoner but would love to see them go toe to toe again. can't wait for next years to start and to see who's riding for who. i've heard rumors of spies going to gresini. hayden is supposed to be going to ducati already, and marco to kawi with hopper. ant might go to WSBK or world supersport for kawi. very interesting...

[lookaught]

Im really excited for the race and will be there to watch it in person! Im a Chris Vermeulen fan but it will probably be Rossi and Stoner... hopefully Nicky Hayden can ride at his "home" track.

Are you going? There is agroup of about 300 aprilia riders all meeting and sitting together in the NW Vista, as well as a big BBQ courtousy of Aprilia. Should be an awesome, awesome weekend!

[minira]

i would love to go, but i'll be watching it from home, which is not too bad. how do you think spies will do? i'd like to see him and nicky go for it and maybe hopper can get into the mix also. should be a great race!

[Brian@AR]

I think it will be a good race. It will come down to who can find the quickest line first. Experience will be a big key on a new track. Rossi is flat out the best and can never be ruled out. Pedrosa, stoner, elias, lorenzo now that he is getting healthy and even vermeulen have proven they can get up to speed quickly at new tracks. If nicky is healthy hopefully he can stay with the front group and go for the W but he is still trying to learn the 800 so I don't think he will be at the front after 5 to 8 laps though.

[minira]

ya nicky's injury might start to hurt after a while like hoppers did in the last couple of races. should be very interesting to see who does come out on top.

[minira]

practice results:
1
13 Anthony WEST AUS Kawasaki Racing Team KAWASAKI 1'53.034 28 31 268.8


2
15 Alex DE ANGELIS RSM San Carlo Honda Gresini HONDA 1'53.151 30 32 0.117 0.117 273.0


3
1 Casey STONER AUS Ducati Team DUCATI 1'53.190 22 22 0.156 0.039 270.7


4
4 Andrea DOVIZIOSO ITA JiR Team Scot MotoGP HONDA 1'53.704 28 29 0.670 0.514 269.8


5
21 John HOPKINS USA Kawasaki Racing Team KAWASAKI 1'53.715 28 28 0.681 0.011 285.5


6
7 Chris VERMEULEN AUS Rizla Suzuki MotoGP SUZUKI 1'53.771 27 28 0.737 0.056 251.9


7
48 Jorge LORENZO SPA Fiat Yamaha Team YAMAHA 1'53.850 32 32 0.816 0.079 243.6


8
69 Nicky HAYDEN USA Repsol Honda Team HONDA 1'53.931 33 33 0.897 0.081 267.1


9
11 Ben SPIES USA Rizla Suzuki MotoGP SUZUKI 1'54.297 18 19 1.263 0.366 261.8


10
24 Toni ELIAS SPA Alice Team DUCATI 1'54.616 29 30 1.582 0.319 253.2


11
46 Valentino ROSSI ITA Fiat Yamaha Team YAMAHA 1'54.795 29 30 1.761 0.179 275.6


12
14 Randy DE PUNIET FRA LCR Honda MotoGP HONDA 1'55.072 30 31 2.038 0.277 261.1


13
56 Shinya NAKANO JPN San Carlo Honda Gresini HONDA 1'55.074 31 31 2.040 0.002 258.1


14
33 Marco MELANDRI ITA Ducati Team DUCATI 1'55.292 25 25 2.258 0.218 259.0


15
5 Colin EDWARDS USA Tech 3 Yamaha YAMAHA 1'55.731 24 27 2.697 0.439 241.0


16
50 Sylvain GUINTOLI FRA Alice Team DUCATI 1'56.125 27 29 3.091 0.394 261.4


17
52 James TOSELAND GBR Tech 3 Yamaha YAMAHA 1'56.271 23 27 3.237 0.146 240.6


18
65 Loris CAPIROSSI ITA Rizla Suzuki MotoGP SUZUKI 1'56.345 28 30 3.311 0.074 272.3

19 2 Dani PEDROSA SPA Repsol Honda Team HONDA 1'56.851 29 33 3.817 0.506 261.6

not surprised to see west out front, but hopefully he can keep this up for the weekend. poor stoner, highsided or lowsided i'm confused on motogp.com. but he crashed again.....oh well!! haha!

[oneseba]

That was the most treacherous of races I've seen. Good thing nobody crashed or hurt or it could have been pretty sour for everybody involved. Rossi is a maniac, he kept on pushing and distancing from Nicky even though the end of the race looked like they were racing in a storm!

[lookaught]

Well it was a fun weekend camping out at the race. Saturday the weather forecasters COMPLETELY blew it and instead of rain and shit all day it was sunny and beautiful.. enough so that I even got a bit burned. Saw a few wrecks, all in the 125cc and 250cc classes, including two highsides and the one guy was knocked out cold I think... he didnt move afterwards.

Raceday the weather guys kind of got it right. It was raining a bit with a forecasted high in the 80s so my brother and I decided to just say eff it, if we're getting wet we just get wet so we wore only a t-shirt and shorts with no rain gear. Being in Row JJ (the very top) it was great for the 125cc race (they lapped only 10 seconds off the MotoGP class times!), then after the rain came and the 250cc race was moved, we went back up to brave the elements.

The first 10 laps... it was great! great racing... hayden out in front for a while, pretty dry on my side (second half) of the track. I thought Nicky put up a good fight but Rossi is just the man and pushed amazingly hard for the conditions. At this point though the weather turned and we found ourselfs soaking wet and sitting in constant 30+mph winds at about 70 degrees.... = freezing. As soon as they red flagged it we booked out got to the already packed up car and managed to beat 99% of the traffic... got home after a treacherous drive with the winds to a house with no freaking power at 11pm. Nothing like a candlelight shower at the end of a looong camping weekend and a nice humid, no air circulation b/c no fan is working bedroom.

In the end though, it turned out better than I thought it would with the weather. Great racing, much better atmosphere IMO compared to F1. I heard that next year it's being moved to August which means it'll be hot as hell, but i'll probably be there again provided Im still living in Pittsburgh and can drive to it. I have the utmost respect for those riders... to drive in those conditions take balls the size of cantelopes, you have to wonder how they fit them on the race saddle

[oneseba]

[minira]

the race was exciting but later got lil boring cuz the damn weather! wish it woud'nt have red flagged but at least there's next year. awesome to see nicky up front, i wonder how he'll fair on the duc next year. it was also awesome to see spies up there toying around with pedrosa. spies can ride and i bet suzuki is kicking themselves for not signing him. too bad the 250 race was canceled. thanks for sharing pics and please post more!