Sepang GP - spoiler

So, another wire-to-wire job by Stoner, his seventh of the year. At
least he's learned how to make it look closer, and the talk about
problems with the bike after the race.

Actually, it was a pretty interesting race if not massively exciting,
with the tires not degrading the way one might have thought in the heat,
including the Michelins. Stoner set his and race fast lap on lap 15 (of
21), in response to Melandri's fastest lap on 14, while Pedrosa's
fastest lap was on 17. De Puniet's was on lap 15, Rossi on lap 20,
7th-place Vermeulen on the last lap. Even Hayden, after his off-track
excursion trying to pass Elias, did his on lap 17, after setting the
last Michelin fastest lap on lap 6.

Lap times were very close among the top five and Hayden, their best
ranging from Stoner's 2:02.108 to de Puniet's 2:02.503, and Elias the
only other rider to get into the 02s. Too bad that Nick got over-anxious
trying to get by Toni, as he was starting his fade, never to do another
02 the rest of the way. Looks like Nick lost about 15 seconds minimum in
that incident all told, and he finished 22 seconds back of Stoner.

What it really looked like was a parity race, as the top guys mostly
held station all the way, and quite close to each other, with the top
five within five seconds of each other at the end. But looking closer it
seems like that was the result of balancing random occurrences - Stoner
either having some problems or just toying with these guys, Bridgestones
slightly better and keeping Melandri (first dry podium of the year, his
previous best 4th and 23 seconds back at Misano) and de Puniet in the
game, and without that this would have been a Pedrosa-Rossi (and maybe
Hayden) race.

Otherwise, it was a good race for Honda, with three of their bikes among
the fastest out there, only Stoner and Rossi posting faster laps, and
barely. It was a great result for de Puniet and Kawasaki, easily the
most competitive they've been all year. Given that the Suzukis finished
nearly 20 seconds farther back on the same tires, it serves to justify
Hopkins' decision to make that move for next year. On the Kawi front,
the Ant West start incident was totally ridiculous, nobody telling him
he'd grabbed the wrong box among the slew of them on the start grid - if
the FIM is going to use differing grid positions for the different
classes they should at least paint the boxes different colors or
something. That probably cost him a season-best result.

A few things to be decided at Valencia now. Rossi leads Pedrosa by 24
points, so only a Dani win and a Vale DNF changes those positions, but
Melandri, Hopkins and Vermeulen are separated by five points in the
fight for 4th-6th, with Melandri jumping two spots today. A mediocre
result in 11th means Capirossi will probably finish 7th, and Hayden
getting back by Edwards at the end today means he's in a very good
position to at least salvage 8th from a snake-bitten season, needing
three more points than Colin. Both Melandri and Hayden, the guys who
fought for the Valencia win two years ago, need a win to avoid a winless
season, and given the way things have come better for Honda, it might
just happen for one of them. De Puniet needs five points over Barros to
squeeze into the top ten, Elias three more than that.

And another win for Stoner would mean 11 on the year, equaling Rossi's
best and one short of Doohan's record. Oh, and a Rossi win would mean
his fifth of the year, tying his '06 worst result since his rookie 500
year, and would be his 63rd of his career, leaving him five short of
Agostini's career record. That means another five next year and they're
tied - remember when not so long ago (like mid '05) we wondered if he'd
reach that mark by the end of 2006?

And the MotoGP broadcast mentioned Ben Spies, actually interviewing him
on the grid! Although that idiot Nick pronounced his name "spies" and
not "speez". A little progress anyway...