MotoGP
Yuki Takahashi takes his Honda RS250RW close to the podium
By
Mar 9, 2008, 01:58

Doha – Qatar – 9th March 2008

With a good start from 8th on the grid, he took 6th at the first corner and rode a strong race to maintain contact with the leaders despite the gap in terms of performance, which held back Yuki on the straights. Yuki was improving every lap, so much so, that he was able to match the pace of the leaders from lap nine, gaining positions before the end of the race. Eventually Yuki finished the race and entered the pits where he was welcomed by the whole team cheering!


Cirano Mularoni – Team manager, JiR Team Scot
“This was better than expected. We know that Yuki comes from a winter without a lot of testing but despite what he had suffered, we all knew Yuki was a fighter and in the race he gets a lot of motivation. In a way, this race could be something like training for the championship for Yuki. In fact he was attacking and maintaining a pace that was very fast. I want to congratulate all of the team, which did an excellent job of putting Yuki in the position to be competitive technically. We don’t have a very good top speed on the straight, but I think that we can be more than competitive at the tight and twisty race tracks that are coming up!”


Yuki Takahashi – Rider, JiR Team Scot 250GP
HONDA RS250RW
5th position - 2’ 00.415”
“I’m very happy as I didn’t think I could be so fast! I did a good start getting two positions immediately, then I tried to keep contact with the leaders of the race but when we were half way through the race the rear tyre started to slide and to maintain that pace was not so easy. This is a very important race finish for us, and I want to thank the team for a good job! Although my lap rhythm was slower in parts and my physical ability was not 100%, I still tried very hard and I know the team and I will do better than this in the future.”


Yutaka Hirano – Chief Technician, JiR Team Scot
“Over the last few days we did a good job on the overall technical package. The chassis was good and our carburettor settings were also very good for the strange climatic conditions that we would encounter tonight. Unfortunately out maximum speed was not so fast on the long straight and Yuki was not in a position to take advantage from any slipstreaming, but later he was able to push very hard on the twistier parts of the circuit. He finally arrived in a very good position at the end of the race but we all want so much better!”


Grand Prix of Qatar 250GP – Final result
1) Mattia Pasini Aprilia
2) Hector Barbera Aprilia
3) Mika Kallio KTM
4) Alex Debon Aprilia
5) Yuki Takahashi Honda

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