MotoGP preview: Silverstone

Venue
Silverstone Circuit, Northamptonshire

Circuit
5.890km; 18 corners, 10 right, 8 left; one of the fastest circuits on the calendar, Silverstone was the venue for Britain’s motorcycle World Championship round from 1977-86. The last winner in that decade was our own Wayne Gardner on a Honda; American Kenny Roberts won three times for Yamaha. The Championship returned to the Northamptonshire track, originally a World War 2 airfield, in 2010.

Lap records:
MotoGP: Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha) 2:02.888 (172.840 km/h), 2012, lap 3
Moto2: Tom Lüthi (Suter) 2:07.667 (166.370 km/h), 2012, lap 17
Moto3: Sandro Cortese (KTM) 2:16.055 (156.113 km/h), 2012, lap 11

MotoGP: Can anyone stop the runaway rookie?
Three weeks in a row: it’s a tough ask in anyone’s language, and even tougher when one bloke keeps winning. The bloke in question is, of course, Repsol Honda’s Marc Marquez, who equalled Valentino Rossi’s 2008 feat of four wins in a row when he came out on top at Brno last weekend. Can he make it five, as Vale did in that sequence five years ago? The Spaniard confesses to having found Silverstone tougher on a Moto2 bike than a 125cc machine, and surprisingly he hasn’t actually won at this circuit in any category – his best result is third in the intermediate class last year.

All the others can do is play catch-up, and the one with most catching-up to do is currently Jorge Lorenzo. The Mallorcan has previous form at Silverstone: he won in 2010 and 2012 and is the current lap record-holder.

“The track I think is really nice, very flowing and also suits our bike,” says Lorenzo, who sits 44pts behind Marquez and 18 behind the other Honda factory ace, Dani Pedrosa. “The problem in Great Britain is always the weather; it is a very challenging grand prix because of that! Despite the conditions we will try everything as usual to try to fight for the victory and cut off the distance to our rivals.”

Sitting 26pts behind his Yamaha partner-in-crime, Valentino Rossi hasn’t enjoyed much success at Silverstone in the three years since the race returned there. In fact the Italian hasn’t even stood on the podium: out of the points altogether in 2010 and 2011, Rossi was only ninth last year for Ducati and is currently battling with Cal Crutchlow’s satellite Yamaha rather than with the big three names at the front.

Crutchlow himself heads home with mixed feelings: keen to make up for his crash at Brno after taking a superb pole position, but aware that Silverstone is a place where he has already come to grief more than once. “Brno wasn’t the best preparation for my home race at Silverstone,” he said this week, “but I go there knowing I have the pace and that I can be challenging at the front. I am really excited for Silverstone and I know the support from the British fans will be incredible, so hopefully I can give them something to cheer about.” Cal, off to Ducati next season, is just 16 points behind The Doctor.

Once again Aussie Bryan Staring will be familiar with his surroundings at Silverstone, not that it helped him a lot in Brno last weekend. “Now we head to another track I know at Silverstone and hopefully we don't have the same problems as in Brno,” says the West Australian. “I am determined to show my true potential, which has not been reflected in recent results.” It certainly has in his teammate’s: Alvaro Bautista is on a run of five straight top-six performances and desperate to get on his first podium of the year at a track where he grabbed his first MotoGP pole last season.

Staring races in the CRT ranks, where Colin Edwards is doing his utmost to drag the NGM Mobile Forward Racing FTR Kawasaki ahead of current runaway class leader Aleix Espargaro on the Power Electronics Aspar ART. Silverstone is the last track where the popular American stood on a MotoGP podium: he was third on a Yamaha in 2011.

Moto2: Redding ready to be a home hero
British fans have high hopes in the intermediate class too. Scott Redding arrives at Silverstone with a 21-point lead over Pol Espargaro: he is the first British rider in any class to go to his home race as world championship leader since Barry Sheene way back in 1977!

Both riders are apparently making their final Moto2 appearance at the famous track with Marc VDS man Redding announcing his move to Honda Gresini. Espargaro’s Tuenti HP 40 Kalex is the form horse of the two: Redding’s Kalex hasn’t taken first place since round five in Italy, and the Spaniard has outscored him by 26 points in the five rounds since then.

Redding’s teammate Mika Kallio is buoyed by his first win since 2008 at Brno last weekend, which was his third podium of the season. The Finn is 52 points behind Redding but only seven behind third-placed Tito Rabat and 31 shy of Espargaro, so he could – should – be a major player in the way the season pans out.

Ant West, meanwhile, goes to Britain in a bit of a slump with no points in his last two outings and severely handicapped, he claims, by a down-on-power engine in his QMMF Speed Up: “Even when I would open the throttle earlier than everybody else [at Brno], the other riders were still pulling away from me and I couldn’t even stay in the slipstream to try and pass them again,” he lamented. “Even riders that are clearly slower in the corners passed me easily on the straights.”

Moto3: Salom set to sail away
Australia’s two young chargers in Moto3 both go to Silverstone carrying injuries. Jack Miller stunned most watchers with his qualifying and early-race speed in Brno, though he tailed off later in the race to finish seventh, but is confident the Caretta Technology FTR Honda can go well again. “For the weekend I will be excited to be back on the bike,” he says. “I’ve had one more week for my shoulder to recover. The track in Silverstone should be not so bad for the Honda. It’s about the same as in Indy. We will see what we can do for the result. I hope we will be among the top Hondas again.”

Aki Ajo’s Red Bull KTM rider Arthur Sissis is also still shaking off the neck strain caused when he came out of the saddle on Saturday in Brno but like Miller he is in high spirits.

”I think if we continue with the line of work that we have had at the last few races, it may turn out to be a good weekend,” he says. ”Hopefully, I’ll get to Sunday 100% recovered from the pain in my neck to have a good race. Silverstone is also one of my favourite tracks –I’d say that it is one of my top three.”

Luis Salom goes to the UK with a 14-point cushion over Maverick Viñales, who is, incidentally, only the second man in motorcycle Grand Prix history to have been on the podium at every one of the first 10 races of a season.

Q: Can you name the first man to achieve that remarkable feat?
A: It was current MotoGP team principal Fausto Gresini, who won every one of the first 10 races of the 1987 125cc season on his Garelli. And in case you were wondering, the 11th and final round of that year went to Paolo Casoli on an AGV.