Another rider has suffered an injury while training, this time it’s Randy de Puniet. The French rider for LCR Honda who took a fantastic third place at Donington, was motocross training with his personal trainer Yves Demaria (a three-time FIM Motorcross champion) when he crashed on a corner, hurting his ankle.

Taken to the hospital in Aix en Provence, x-rays revealed a fractured left ankle. DePuniet underwent surgery to insert a screw into his ankle and left the hospital on Monday and will meeting with the Clinica Mobile doctors to start his rehabilitation therapy.

De Puniet stated:

“Yves and I have a specific training programme to improve my performance on track this year. This programme has helped me a lot so far and through the summer break I didn’t want to stop training. So we went out to do a short motocross session, but unfortunately I had a fall and the impact on the ground caused a fracture of the left ankle.I am very disappointed about this setback but training is very important for me in order to be in good shape in MotoGP. I will do my best to race in Brno and I am sure that the Clinica Mobile staff will support me in the best way.”

DePuniet is currently 8th in the MotoGP championship standings and is linked for a place in Herve Poncharal’s Yamaha Tech 3 team in 2010.

Continue reading: Randy de Puniet breaks ankle, Brno in doubt

The Paddock girls during the British Grand Prix at Donington Park this time weren’t just pretty faces and hot bods serving as titillating appetizers before the main event, they were really useful considering the weather conditions that England served up during last weekend’s races.

Continue reading: Donington GP Paddock Girls Video

Prince Harry showed up at Donington to take in the British Gran Prix races. Usually royalty likes to lay low and avoid the paps like the plague, but in this case young Harry got photographed while riding pillion behind Randy Mamola on Ducati’s MotoX2.

The Prince got treated to a Mamola style wheelie and on the damp track almost got highsided during one of the high speed laps around the English track.

Both Princes are avid bike fans and just a couple of weeks ago the paparazzi caught Prince William riding a Ducati 1198S.

Continue reading: Prince Harry on Ducati D16 with Randy Mamola

Chris Vermeulen talks about today’s race at Donington Park, the tough weather and track conditions, the problems with his tires.

The Aussie rider is 9th in the standings after the 10th round of MotoGP Championship that sees Valentino Rossi leading with 187 points, trailed by team mate Jorge Lorenzo with 162 points followed by Ducati’s Casey Stoner with 150 points.

Round eleven of the 2009 MotoGP World Championship takes place after the summer break, at Brno in the Czech Republic, on August 16.

Continue reading: More from Donington - Chris Vermeulen

Andrea Dovizioso took his first ever MotoGP win at Donington Park in treacherous track conditions and unpredicatable weather which saw two satellite riders, Colin Edwards and Randy DePuniet take their places on the podium.

Coming in a lonely fourth was a happy Alex DeAngelis. Toni Elias led the first two laps fell back to fifth and then crashed on the 8th lap.

The race also saw Jorge Lorenzo crash out while leading in the 9th lap after breaking on the slippery white line and also saw Valentino Rossi crash while he was leading on the 20th lap, but the Italian was able to restart and finish in fifth in front of homeboy James Toseland.

Casey Stoner and Nicky Hayden both gambling on rain tires, the only two riders to do so on the grid and finished 14th and 15th but were lapped by the other riders.

Continue reading: MotoGP Donington – Andrea Dovizioso takes his 1st MotoGP Victory

Chris Vermeulen talks about today’s difficult qualifying session at Donington Park. The Aussie besides having problems with his hip is recovering from a grade one acromioclavicular separation of the left shoulder.

According to Vermeulen’s team mate Loris Capirossi who qualified in 14th, Suzuki’s problems may be due to the electronics managed by 2D who and isn’t as up to date like Marelli’s which is used by Yamaha and Ducati.

Continue reading: Chris Vermeulen on Donington Qualifying

Valentino Rossi took his fourth pole postion in today’s last ever MotoGP qualifying session at Donington Park setting a best lap of 1.28.116 set in the final three minutes and couldn’t be bettered by Dani Pedrosa who took second, just 0.095s from Rossi.

“For me, is a surprise, because unfortunately we don’t try the harder tire this morning, but we expect looking at the performance of the other guys to have a good grip this afternoon,” Rossi, who has a 14 point championship lead over Lorenzo, said. “But when I put the harder tire on we were in trouble and I don’t have enough grip for push a lot and my lap time was quite bad. So start in the box, we modify a little bit the bike. We improve a little bit on the hard, but it was anyway not fantastic. So we have to work on the setting. But after we make another modify, put the soft and with the soft tire, great grip. My bike turns and flowing good in the fast part, so we did a good job with the team and so happy about this pole position, because it’s a surprise. So for tomorrow we wait for the weather condition, but anyway we start from the front.”

Dani Pedrosa:

“We did a good job in both sessions today and I’m happy to qualify on the front row because, in reality, that’s more important than taking pole position. On my last run at the end of the qualifying session I found some traffic on the circuit which caused me to lose my concentration and rhythm slightly, so I think I could have gone a little quicker. But still, the middle of the front row is OK. Our dry set-up is nearly there so we’ll aim to make just a few little improvements before the race. The weather is looking changeable for tomorrow, though at least we’ve had some practice time in the wet yesterday. If it’s raining I’d like to improve my riding and my pace a bit but the weather is out of our control so we’ll have to see. It’s the last MotoGP race at Donington tomorrow and of course I’d like a good result to sign off with - preferably a win.”

Continue reading: MotoGP Donington Qualifying - Valentino Rossi takes Pole

Dani Pedrosa set the fastest lap time in the dying seconds of the session to clock a best time of 1.38.627 in Friday’s practice at Donington Park.

A heavy rain shower during the 125cc session left the track wet for the start of the MotoGP practice, but the weather conditions slowly improved and a strong wind starting drying out the track.

Pedrosa’s last lap knocked factory Ducati rider Casey Stoner off top spot. Stoner who had been leading the chart by 0.245 secs, was second, but was also the rider who did the fewest laps of anyone in the field and sat out the last minutes talking with his team.

Valentino Rossi clocked a best time of 1.38.917 to finish just 0.045s adrift of Stoner and almost three tenths from Pedrosa.
Andrea Dovizioso who had been up to second during the session finished fourth, while Lorenzo was down to fifth, 0.478s off Pedrosa’s best lap.

Marco Melandri had an impressive session , running in the top three for much of the session with his Hayate finally finished sixth. Mika Kallio seventh, and Colin Edwards to eighth, Toni Elias and Nicky Hayden closed the top ten .

Loris Capirossi was eleventh and James Toseland was running in the top six, but fell back to 12th when his Yamaha ran out of fuel. Gabor Talmacsi was also impressive during this free practice especially on the wet, was 13th and Chris Vermeulen 14th.

Randy de Puniet, Alex de Angelis and Niccolo Canepa occupied the remaining places.

Continue reading: MotoGP Donington -Dani Pedrosa leads the way in FP1

Former Grand Prix rider Ralf Waldmann at the glorious age of 43 will be returning to action in Sunday’s 250cc race at Donnington Park. The German will be replacing injured Vladimir Lenov in the Veissmann Keifer Racing Team on an Aprilia.

Waldmann who retired from racing in 2002 with 20 GP wins, is a shareholder with former GP racer Martin Wimmer in MZ Motorcyles and last week during the Sachsenring GP presented the new MZ 250cc bike powered by a four-stroke KTM, which has already undergone a testing programme and will be ready for competition in the near future.

Source | motorradonline

Continue reading: Ralf Waldmann to race at Donington Park