Casey Stoner - Sachsenring 2010
Australia’s Casey Stoner has attacked MotoGP track designs following the tragic death of Japanese rider Shoya Tomizawa in Sunday’s Moto2 San Marino Grand Prix.
Speaking to the Sydney Morning Herald he spoke about how the death of Tomizawa had affected everyone.
Tomizawa, 19, suffered multiple head and internal injuries when he was struck by following bikes in a sickening 240kph crash.
In the MotoGP race which followed Stoner, still fighting an ill-handling Ducati, finished a distant fifth and slumped to fifth place in the championship.
The race was won by Spaniard Dani Pedrosa on a Honda, ahead of championship leader Jorge Lorenzo with Valentino Rossi third, both on Yamahas.
The MotoGP riders lined up for their race, battling emotions to stay focussed, knowing that Tomizawa was fighting a losing battle for his life.
Most riders, including Rossi and Stoner, had watched the brutal crash on television as they waited for their race to follow the Moto2 event.
“I could feel it on the grid, everybody kind of knew, so I didn’t need to ask – I could feel it,” said American rider Nicky Hayden.
Rossi said : “I knew it was bad. I hoped only for fractures but I thought he was dead.”
Stoner, the 2007 world champion, led the call for a safety review to instil a feeling of caution amongst riders.
Tomizawa was racing flat out through the fastest corner of the circuit when he ran wide over the edge of the track, spun sideways as he tried to recover and was struck by Italian Alex de Angelis and Briton Scott Redding.
“The race should have been stopped, you could see from the television that this was a crash you couldn’t walk away from,” said an emotional Stoner.
“Tomizawa was a rider to watch in the future, this is extremely disappointing.”
Stoner says the placement of smooth tarmac run-off areas and artificial grass on track edges has taken the fear factor out of running off the track and made riders feel “bullet proof.”
“The extra tarmac gives everybody an invincible feeling that they can run-off and come straight back on,” he said.
“It is ridiculous, riders become too confident and without fear they ride with too much confidence and things like this can happen.
“Grass is not the best thing but if it was real grass or real dirt people wouldn’t push that far.
“I was watching the race and these things can happen, it didn’t get inside my head before the race and you know there is always a chance it could happen to you.”
Pedrosa led every lap of a largely uneventful MotoGP race for his fourth win of the season. He is 63 points behind Lorenzo with six races remaining.
