{"id":221,"date":"2007-03-11T11:20:27","date_gmt":"2007-03-11T06:02:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.vicky.in\/blog\/qatar-motogp\/"},"modified":"2007-03-11T11:20:27","modified_gmt":"2007-03-11T06:02:27","slug":"qatar-motogp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.vicky.in\/blog\/qatar-motogp\/","title":{"rendered":"Qatar MotoGP"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stoner holds off Rossi in Qatar \t\t \t\t\t <\/font><\/p>\n\n\n
\n

\"Casey<\/p>\n

Stoner celebrates his first ever MotoGP victory<\/em><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

Casey Stoner won a cat-and-mouse battle with Valentino Rossi to take victory in the season-opening Qatar MotoGP.<\/strong> <\/font> The pair, who started at the front of the grid, traded the lead throughout the race with Australian Stoner finally prevailing for his first MotoGP win. <\/font><\/p>\n

Rossi’s Yamaha was superior on the turns but Stoner’s Ducati gave him the edge with awesome straight-line speed. <\/font><\/p>\n

\t \t \t<\/font><\/p>\n

Reigning champion Nicky Hayden looked ill at ease on the new Honda and finished down in eighth place. <\/font> Hayden’s team-mate Dani Pedrosa won a hard-fought battle with American John Hopkins to take third place. <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n\n\n
<\/td>\n\n

 <\/p>\n

\t\t \t\tA win is better but second is not so bad<\/strong><\/p>\n

Valentino Rossi<\/em><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

Northern Ireland rider Jeremy McWilliams was not fit enough to take part after hurting his leg in a crash during Friday’s qualifying. Rossi started on pole and held the lead until the end of the first lap when Stoner’s power down the straight propelled him past the Italian. <\/font><\/p>\n

From then on, the pair shared the lead and began to pull away from Spaniard Pedrosa. <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n\n\n
 <\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

Stoner held the lead for the majority of the second half of the race and when Rossi tried to make a move with four laps to go, the Australian immediately went back in front. The 21-year-old then put in his fastest lap on the last circuit of the track to claim victory. <\/font><\/p>\n

“We struggled in a few parts of the track during the race where Valentino was a bit quicker but I just used what we had to our advantage,” said the Australian. <\/font><\/p>\n

Five-time champion Rossi was more than satisfied with his start to the season. “The Yamaha was well balanced and took the corners well,” the 28-year-old Rossi said. “I am happy because we made the right tyre choice.” <\/font><\/p>\n

“A win is better but second is not so bad.” <\/font><\/p>\n

\n

Qatar MotoGP result<\/strong>
\n1. Casey Stoner (AUS) Ducati 43min 02.788 seconds
\n2. Valentino Rossi (ITA) Yamaha +2.838 secs
\n3. Dani Pedrosa (ESP) Honda +8.530
\n4. John Hopkins (USA) Suzuki +9.071
\n5. Marco Melandri (ITA) Honda +17.433
\n6. Colin Edwards (USA) Yamaha +18.647
\n7. Chris Vermeulen (AUS) Suzuki +22.916
\n8. Nicky Hayden (USA) Honda +23.057
\n9. Alex Barros (BRA) Ducati +25.961
\n10. Shinya Nakano (JPN) Honda +28.456<\/font>Source BBC<\/em> sport<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Stoner holds off Rossi in Qatar Stoner celebrates his first ever MotoGP victory Casey Stoner won a cat-and-mouse battle with Valentino Rossi to take victory in the season-opening Qatar MotoGP. The pair, who started at the front of the grid, traded the lead throughout the race with Australian Stoner finally prevailing for his first MotoGP … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Qatar MotoGP”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[24,17],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.vicky.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.vicky.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.vicky.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.vicky.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.vicky.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=221"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.vicky.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.vicky.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=221"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.vicky.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=221"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.vicky.in\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=221"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}