MotoGP Riders Crash at Phillip Island

Jorge Lorenzo, 2015 MotoGP Champion was among the few riders who crashed during the closing stages of pre-season test at Phillip Island. Temperature drop due to cold breeze and mid-afternoon rain was the main reason of crash at the track. They were pushing hard towards the last few laps while testing the new Michelin rubber. Other than the Yamaha Movistar rider, an Octo Pramac Ducati rider, Danilo Petrucci, broke his hand due to a crash at turn 8 of the track. Jorge Lorenzo won the final round and the title for 2015 MotoGP held at Valencia, beating his teammate Valentino Rossi by a margin of just 5 points.

Speaking about the reason for the crash, Jorge Lorenzo said, “My crash was just putting in too hard a tyre for the conditions.  We didn’t have any crashes for the riders until the last few hours, but after the morning rain the track was never the same; we wanted to go faster and faster but the track was cold. We went with an old hard tyre, and it was too much for the conditions of the tarmac.” He further added, “The tyre has improved since the first time we tried it last year, but as the number of crashes demonstrates, Michelin still need to improve. We still have some work to do. The rear tyre is good though – I like it a lot! It offers the riders good grip. But there’s still work to do on the front.”

Massimo Meregalli, Lorenzo’s team boss, stated, "Overall we can be quite satisfied with the work we have done, if you take into account the little amount of testing time that was available over these last three days. The only glitch was Jorge's crash, most likely due to the cold conditions. Though we had some mixed weather and again weren't able to put in many laps, we completed most of the work that we had planned for this test. We came here with the imperative to decide on which bike we would start the season with.” He added, “When the track dried in the afternoon we were able to make a comparison between the two models and chose accordingly. We are confident we will be ready for more testing in Qatar in a two weeks' time."

With the 2016 racing season starting on March 20, 2016, all the riders are practising hard for it and are in the final stages of testing. Companies like Yamaha, Ducati, Kawasaki, Honda and Aprilia have already unveiled their MotoGP bikes for this year. The previous season witnessed one of the best races of all time involving the controversy surrounding Valentino Rossi and Marc Marquez. Following it, we can surely expect an entertaining and power-packed season this time with all new bikes.

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