Brno MotoGP: Nicky Hayden suffers wrist damage in big crash

Nicky Hayden is anticipating a gruelling Czech Republic MotoGP clash tomorrow after he chipped a bone in his left wrist after a heavy crash during qualifying. 

The 2006 world champion will start the 22-lap race from eighth on the grid having clocked a best time of 1.57.635.

But he faces a tough battle to contend for the top six tomorrow after a big crash at turn three during this afternoon’s decisive qualifying session at the Brno circuit.

Hayden lost the front of his factory GP10 and although he looked to suffer only an innocuous slide on his back into the gravel trap, he revealed later he’d chipped the radius bone in his left wrist.

The American said: “We started out well and on my first exit on a hard tyre I was able to improve my lap time quite a lot. We got into the 1.57s quite quickly and I thought we were in good shape to have a shot at a good grid position. Unfortunately my first flying lap on the softer tyre ended in turn three – I just lost the front quite early on entry, I don’t know why. I know people always says ‘I did nothing different!’ but honestly, even looking at the data, the brake pressure and speed was the same as my previous runs. We need to have a look at that and understand it tonight. Luckily it wasn’t too heavy and everything on my body is fine other than my left hand. It must have got caught under the bike because it’s very sore and even though we tried to go back out I couldn’t change direction. We’ve had it checked out by X-ray which showed we took a chunk off the tip of the radius, which isn’t good, but my scaphoid is okay and that’s the main thing because I have a screw in there and it’s not damaged. Just walking around the paddock it’s not too painful but we’ll have to wait and see how it goes over 22 laps on the bike tomorrow.”