Malaysia GP: Interwetten Honda race report

Aoyama finishes Sepang race in Top 7

The Malaysian Grand Prix in Sepang ended today with the best result so far this season for Hiroshi Aoyama and the Interwetten Honda MotoGP Team. Aoyama finished the race on 7th place and underlined that there is more to come from him as the race could have finish one or two positions higher for him, if there would not have been the aggressive actions of his long time congruent Marco Simoncelli, whit who he already was fighting for the world championship last year. Aoyama was able to fight in the middle group, which was fighting for 4th position and could ride an exciting race with a lot of position changes. The whole team worked hard for this achievement and is now looking forward to Phillip Island, where the last of the three consecutive overseas races will take place next weekend.

Hiroshi Aoyama, 7 - 41'23.666:
"The race was very tough, as the conditions with the heat and humidity were really hard. Physically and mentally I was on the limit and also technical it was not much more possible under these conditions. At the beginning I was finding my rhythm and then I started to overtake rider by rider. Then I was able to stay with the group that was fighting for fourth position. I could have leaded this group, as my rhythm was better than theirs. But Simoncelli rode a very aggressive race and touched me a couple of times and I had to make him place not to risk anything. The seventh place is the best result so far in this season and my team worked very hard to achieve this. I want to thank my team and I hope that we can improve the result at Phillip Island."

Tom Jojic, Crew Chief:
"Hiro could have been better without the action of Simoncelli, but we are satisfied with the result. In lap seven Hiro's lap time matched the lap time of Lorenzo. This shows that he can go with the group and we look forward to Phillip Island now."

-source: interwetten