Ducati Monster Forum

Pissing down rain for FP1.

Crusty leads TFOG and The Monkey by a RCH.
Jackass, MM and Dovi about a half second back.
Nicky 10th, 2 seconds off.
Jones 14th, 2.5 sec back.
JLo next to last, nearly 5 seconds off.
Gimpy Bradley last, down 8 seconds.

Saturday supposed to be similar amount of rain, then decent Sunday, but cold.
However, this is PI, so it may snow, or clear off and be blazing hot.
Cold may tip the balance more toward the Suzukis and Hondas.

But if the first dry track occurs on a cold 'warmup' Sunday about Noon, and a colder race at 4pm... we could easily have our 9th winner.
I'm betting it's Nicky, and it'll just blow the lid off this season!

FP2 pretty much a washout.

Really cool to have Vermuelen in with the announcing team.
Interesting perspective!

If it stays wet then Jackass and Crusty should be favorites.
Crusty thinks he's back 'ome in Ol' Blighty, TFOG can use his Zimmer frame to assist with the bike to bike transfer in a flag to flag situation and Monkey is just ... Monkey Magic [Dolph] Monkey Magic.
Go Nicky.

Needles and Scoober are freezing their asses off down there.

Lovely day down here.    :( Started with wind knocking out the power here.

Great to see the bikes up close.
Very interesting contrasting kean angles between MM and Nicky.
Jackass set his lap a little later than Crusty and was right on the limit. Small off shortly later.
Was so obvious JLo was just cruising around.

You getting the icy wind off the water? Even on a nice day if the wind comes off the water grip levels drop and you feel like you're skating around.
They gotta move this round back to the start of the season like the old days.

Forecast is cold, but fine 13 C for race day, but we'll see.
Make that 12 C and cloudy.

The Old Goat was penalized by Race Direction for being on the wet tyres for too many laps and is sitting in P20. ???

Just the icy wind would be ok. The fact it was icy wind full of water. Not so much.

I think they still jave too many old jackets to sell to change the dates.

I'd much rather hear Chris on motogp than Steve Day. ;)

Apparently Michelin said 10 laps max.
Rossi did 9 hot laps, plus one each in and out laps.

Seems race teams have trouble counting laps at PI.  [cheeky]

Cough [bullshit] cough

Well of course.
Making an example out of him without doing any real damage.

What I find ludicrous is they counted the out and in lap.

When Honda screwed the pooch  with Marquez at PI they didn't count the out and warm up lap.

Just bullshit.

Whether or not it does harm remains to be seen. There's no guarantee he will set another time good enough to avoid Q1.

That's the problem, the rain is very heavy and driven hard by very strong winds so unless theres a break in the weather he's stuck in P20. I reckon they will have to spend time cleaning up the track tonight and Sunday morning. I feel sorry for all those who camped down there as the rain is pounding our house hard on the south east walls and coming in sideways.  Honestly this is the worst weather in years.

If the weather holds as forecast, it will force him to go through Q1...so I would hardly say no real damage done.

And when you consider the rule was based on the same tires not lasting 10 laps at Assen on a 13*C warmer *drying* track, it's horse shit. Rossi's tires barely even looked scrubbed let alone shedding tread cap.

JL must be chuckling to himself.

Perhaps I was a bit hasty in the assumption of no real damage, but I must point out I had no influence over the decision!  [laugh]

Hey, now him and George' are in the same boat.
Evens up the playing field and makes 'em both work for their dinner.

 ;D

If the weather doesnt break, there will be no events today, no FP, no qualy, no support races. The wind would be dangerous cresting over the end of Gardner Straight. If the wind prevails race day it'll be interesting to see if the wings stay or are changed.

Of course its the worst weather in years.   [bang]

Showers here at present.
Such a muddy bog they have closed all the car parks to cars. By the time we left wherever you stood you would sink enough for water to flood in.

You blokes camping or hotel/pub?

I am glad we are not camping. Rented a house.

Id say tents got blown down. The track will probably need a good scrub.

FP3 was a wild session.

MM timed it perfectly on an inter front, slick rear.
Miller right on his heels full slicks.
Nicky 8th!

Rossi 12th, JLo 21st (last), both on merit.

Q1 will be epic, lots of heavy hitters stuck in there.

Moto3 qualy was a race!

That storm hit quick!!

And sucked.

 [laugh] [laugh] I'll bet.

Crusty and George made it through to Q2..

Tyre roulette in Q2 on a drying track with a major rainstorm 10 minutes away!

That was good stuff!! Nicky looked pretty damn strong for not being on a GP bike for awhile.

MM crushed 'em.
Hard.
Crusty 2nd, Pol 3rd.
Nicky 7th.

JLo was a make the beast with two backsing rolling chicane. 12th.

MM overtakes VR and JL in pole positions. Banked a few fast laps on slicks while the storm gathered at sea. MM said in the interview that you could see the storm clouds approaching so they had to take a quick gamble on slicks while the storm gathered off shore.

JL looked lost out there even though he was on slicks like MM and others. Jackass 5th on intermediates.

(http://i1024.photobucket.com/albums/y304/tonykokonis/725_zpsvlvrz6xy.jpeg)

Dovi meets wild Aussie fauna (Scoober).

(http://i1024.photobucket.com/albums/y304/tonykokonis/FB_IMG_1477119888036_zpspxwf37bk.jpg)

Jack and Needle.

Nicky!!! He out qualified VR, Jorghey and a slew of others that have been riding their bikes all season!  I'm not saying he should move back to GP, since they would just put him on a shitty bike, but wait until he gets a new Fireblade!

He did well and this track suits him I reckon. With better luck he would have won a few races instead of podiums here. I've always been a big fan and people almost forget he is a world champion.

Moto 3 carnage. Dropping like flies.

Moto 3 had a sixteen rider fight for 3rd place! :D

(http://i1024.photobucket.com/albums/y304/tonykokonis/Resized_20161023_1351491_zpssr9z1nzr.jpeg)

Moto 2, what a finish!

Rossi is on make the beast with two backsing fire and MM just crashed out.  :o

That track can cool off in the late arvo.

Crusty [clap]

My boy, from 13th to the podium.  [clap]

Your boy did good.

The Rossi fans around us were not happy we were cheering for Mav to catch Rossi.

 [clap] [clap] [clap] make the beast with two backsem' and feed em' beans.

There were some nasty crashes this weekend.

The kids earned their money.

The weather was as bad as the hurricane @ Indy. It was so unpredictable that I have no idea how they went out on Sunday afternoon. It's time to schedule PI at the beginning of the year.

 [thumbsup]. Needs to happen.

I know my feelings are not shared by many but I miss Iannone.......


http://www.motogp.com/en/news/2016/10/24/dovizioso-fourth-in-phillip-island-is-really-good-for-me/214158