Dani Pedrosa had to settle for third place in the MotoGP at Losail behind his new team-mate Casey Stoner, while the other Repsol Honda of Andrea Dovizioso finished fourth.
Honda have dominated pre-season testing and looked like they would do so in the first race of the 2011 season under Losail’s floodlights. Pedrosa made his trademark terrific start to grab the lead at turn 1 from poleman Stoner, but with the pair tussling at the front, it was soon Stoner that grabbed the initiative. Meanwhile, Yamaha’s world champion Jorge Lorenzo was out to crash the Honda party, finally securing second after briefly fighting for top spot. While Pedrosa’s tyres saw him fall back into Lorenzo’s grasp as the race progressed, Dovizioso put paid to the valiant efforts of Gresini Honda’s Marco Simoncelli, the two Italians fighting tooth and nail and even swapping paintwork at one point.
Further down the field, Hiroshi Aoyama improved on a 12th place grid slot to finish strongly in 10th.
In the Moto2, there was disappointment for Marc Márquez, who suffered a slow getaway off the line from second spot and crashed on lap 16 in his debut in the series. Elsewhere, Kenan Sofuoglu finished 18th, while Scott Redding was 31st.
MotoGP Qatar classification
1) Casey Stoner – Honda – 42:38.569
2) Jorge Lorenzo – Yamaha – +03.440
3) Dani Pedrosa – Honda – +05.051
4) Andrea Dovizioso – Honda – +05.942
5) Marco Simoncelli – Honda Gresini – +07.358
6) Ben Spies – Yamaha – +10.468
7) Valentino Rossi – Ducati – +16.431
8) Colin Edwards – Yamaha Tech 3 – +26.293
9) Nicky Hayden – Ducati – +27.416
10) Hiroshi Aoyama – Honda Gresini – +28.920
Want more?
- The inside line on winter testing
- Official MotoGP website
- Latest blogs from Dani Pedrosa and Marc Márquez
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