Donington Review: He's Back

Rewind to 2007 and the guy who won ten races. Stoner is back.

He had a spring in his step and a sparkle in his eye from Friday onwards after pulverising the rest by half a second a lap in the dry, and then again in the wet of Saturday. The rest were nowhere.

There are not many of the MotoGP events that I have been to where someone has been that dominant ten minutes into Friday morning's free practice session, carrying it through to qualifying and then the race, but the Donington weekend will stand out as one where there should only have been two trophies up for grabs - second and third.

Casey Stoner on the Ducati GP8 at Donington Park © Back Page Images

So where did Stoner find the pace? That was at the testing he did after Barcelona with the 2008-spec engine, an engine that we have now learnt was replaced by the 2007 engine for Mugello and Catalunya. This proved that the work done on the electronics to that 2008 engine while it was out of the bike are night and day better for him.

"Off the bottom end it's not so lumpy and less susceptible to make the bike pump when exiting corners," he said.

"In Barcelona we went instantly 0.5s faster, and today (Friday) everything came very easily. We feel fast and comfortable. It didn't feel like a qualifying lap; it felt easy and sweet to me."

I knew that look in his eye and the shrug of the shoulders; it was as if he just could not understand why the others were so slow. Just what was the matter with them? It was all so easy ...

And that he proved on Sunday afternoon in the near-hurricane wind conditions of what felt like a tempestuous spring day. Not even Valentino Rossi had a chance.

Now, no matter what some of the more moronic side of the crowd were jeering or gesticulating at him on the cooling-down lap, Casey could still win the championship. Ducati's Livio Suppo is a realist and he knows that to get 45 points back on Rossi in ten races is a tall order, and a very different kettle of fish from Rossi clawing back 51 points on Hayden in 2006 to lead into the last round that year/

But Stoner could just do it ...

Lorenzo is out of the championship running, leaving Rossi and Pedrosa at the head of the table after eight races from 18. Stoner has already had his 'bad luck race' this year when the engine failed at Le Mans, so if the others have a 'bad luck race' then it could close up very quickly indeed.

And with the next test with the actual MotoGP riders, as opposed to the test riders, being scheduled for after Brno on August 18th, whatever packages people have now look to be the ones for the next four races at Assen, Sachsenring, Laguna and Brno itself - 10 points up for grabs there!

Jerry Burgess and Valentino Rossi © Back Page Images

Assen this weekend is Rossi territory, but with Stoner on fire and out for speed and the feeling of being the underdog, it could be the comeback of the modern era by the time we get to Valencia.

It goes without saying that the biggest moment of the day in Donington was Scott Redding hitting the front of the 125 race with six laps to go. He'd crossed the gap to Andrea Iannone with fastest lap after fastest lap, eventually pushing Iannone into a mistake.

The cheer that went up was one of those this-doesn't-happen-very-often moments at a major sporting event.

I've witnessed Nigel Mansell at Silverstone in 1987, 1991 and 1992, Colin McRae winning the WRC in Chester in 1995 and Rossi winning every MotoGP race at Mugello, but the pride in hearing that kind of cheer for the 15-year-old was something to go in the memory bank.

Redding had never ridden a complete lap of Donington Park before Friday morning, leaving him with two and a half hours of set-up time before the race; and half of that was washed away with the underwater conditions of Saturday.

But that mattered little as he blitzed them to become the youngest-ever winner of a Grand Prix, winning that race just eight races into his international career, and even beating Rossi's mark from 1996 when he as a rookie took 11 races to win his first one in Brno.

The quiet lad from Gloucestershire (Italian journalists just cannot pronounce his home county!) has sheer, raw, rough diamond talent like the Schumacher, Rossi and McRae. He just gets on the bike and rides the hell out of it like I have seen no other before.

After commentating on approaching 600 bike Grands Prix and only hearing the national anthem once before when Jeremy McWilliams won the Assen 250cc race 2001, I have a good feeling we may hear it again soon.

The rumours about where the British MotoGP race will be held after the end of the current contract with Donington Park are ones that I hope are serious. Silverstone may not have the sweeping curves and corners of the pre-war lines of Donington, but at least the the current F1 venue has some idea of how to look after a large amount of people.

The car park exits favoured whoever was bravest in poking their nose into the traffic, while in all my years I have never come across such arrogant, unhelpful 'traffic management' staff.

125cc Grand Prix winner Scott Redding © Back Page Images

And as for the internet in the press office - no wonder it was free ...

The circuit itself did, however, look well-kept, tidy and with some new camera angles from Dorna, making it look better on TV than it may have been in reality.

Carmelo Ezpeleta of Dorna is a commercial man though, and he cares not a jot how many big screen TVs are there, nor grandstands nor car park spaces.

He takes the money Donington pays for the privilege of the circus coming to town. The question is, has Silverstone got any money spare to take MotoGP there, or will Ezpeleta put his foot down and demand some upgrades, that go beyond a lick of paint, from Donington?

Maybe it is going to take someone getting killed by a MotoGP bike on the last lap for the race to get a change of venue? Mums and Dads, not just yoofs, were running like hell onto the track on the last lap, causing some to slow while still racing. Cooling-down lap maybe, but while still at 170mph?

But as one very senior and experienced person said after the race, maybe that is the only way to get the message through to some of the idiots who think rules don't apply.