Carlos Checa celebrates 33rd birthday with magic third16/10/2005

Ducati star Carlos Checa had a magic run with the number 3 in this weekend’s Australian Grand Prix: After hitting the 333 kph mark in Saturday’s free practice session, the Spaniard celebrated his 33rd birthday on Sunday with a thrilling battle against the bike with number 33 on the fairing, Marco Melandri, to eventually finish in a brilliant 3rd position in the race. “Maybe I should ask Max Biaggi to swap starting numbers now”, Checa joked.

Expectations had been high within Bridgestone and Checa’s Ducati team from the very beginning of the weekend, with Checa scoring third and second places throughout the free practice sessions, and then topping the list in the only qualifying on Saturday, with Nicky Hayden, Valentino Rossi and Sete Gibernau edging past him in the final minutes of the session. Checa started the race from the second row of the grid, and whilst Hayden and Rossi battled for the lead, he had it out in the pursuing group with Marco Melandri. After holding fourth place in Melandri’s slipstream for most of the race, it all came down to the final lap, when the pair swapped positions twice, before Checa used the superior power of his Ducati Desmosedici and the superior traction of his Bridgestone tyres to pull away from the Italian Honda ace after the last, ultra-fast lefthand corner before the main straight.                                          

Kawasaki star Shinya Nakano also enjoyed a fantastic last lap in which he beat two other rivals, Spanish Yamaha rider Toni Elias and Japanese Honda ace Makoto Tamada, to take an impressive seventh place. American Suzuki rider John Hopkins was the third top ten finisher for Bridgestone, with a successful last lap attack on local hero and GP rookie Chris Vermeulen. The  celebrations  within  Team  Suzuki  MotoGP  and  Ducati  Corse  Team  were  overshadowed  by  two  accidents  that  had happened in short succession on Friday morning. In cold and windy conditions of the first free practice sessions, both Suzuki rider Kenny Roberts and Ducati’s hero Loris Capirossi crashed in the first, fast righthand corner of the track. Roberts suffered a broken left wrist, Capirossi was hospitalised with a heavily bruised chest and some internal bleeding, but his condition improved over the weekend, and he will be able to fly back home to Italy.

Carlos Checa – Ducati Marlboro Team – 3rd position:
“This third place tastes like a victory! I wasn’t quite able to ride at the same speed as yesterday, and braking isn’t our strongest area either, so I wasn’t in the position to attack earlier in the race. On the last lap, I eventually caught Marco and passed him, then  he  passed  me  again.  But  out  of  the  fast  last  corner,  his  bike  became  a  bit  unsettled,  whereas  I  used  the  better acceleration and the better drive of my Ducati to my advantage and pulled away to take this third place – a very exciting final! We had tested a lot of new Bridgestone tyres during practice, and our choice for the race turned out to be very, very good. It is a big satisfaction for me that we have arrived at this level, because if you consider where we came from, the team, the tyre manufacturer and myself, we certainly made more progress than anybody else this season. That’s a big boost to everybody’s moral. We are competitive, and we will now try everything to confirm this in the races to come. Most of all, I want to dedicate this third place to Loris. I hope he is getting well soon. We all miss him – it is a strange feeling to be the only rider in the garage!”

Hiroshi Yamada - Motorcycle Racing Manager – Bridgestone Motorsport:
“Another very good race for us! We want to thank and congratulate Carlos Checa and the Ducati Corse team, they’ve done a great job this weekend. At the same time, we feel all very sorry for Loris Capirossi and Kenny Roberts after their unfortunate accidents on the first day of practice. The reason for these crashes is still not completely clear but we hope they’ll be well soon. As far as tyre performance goes, the new specs that we developed for this race worked very, very well during the race. This circuit is very hard on the rear tyre in terms of grip and durability, but the last lap performances of Carlos, Shinya Nakano and John Hopkins are the best proof that we’ve mastered the challenge. Now there are two more races to go, and we will continue to push ahead in our development work!”

Bridgestone Results:
3. Carlos Checa (SPA) Ducati, 41.12,757, 7. Shinya Nakano (JPN) Kawasaki, 41.53,597, 10. John Hopkins (UDA) Suzuki, 41.58,802, 16. Olivier Jacque (F) Kawasaki, - 2 laps. Did not start: Kenny Roberts (USA) Suzuki, Loris Capirossi, (I) Ducati