Indy MotoGP: Casey Stoner marches towards 2011 world title

Casey Stoner produced another MotoGP masterclass in Indianapolis yesterday to tighten his grip on the 2011 world championship chase.

The Australian romped to a third successive victory and seventh of a brilliant debut campaign with Honda to stretch his advantage over Jorge Lorenzo to 44-points with just six races remaining.

Once he grabbed the lead from Repsol Honda team-mate Dani Pedrosa on lap seven, Stoner’s charge to a 30th premier class success never looked in any doubt.

The 2007 world champion said: “I knew this race was going to be hard and it ended up being very true. The track has been very difficult to ride and very difficult to understand. But the team managed to get the bike sorted, and we managed to ride this track pretty well this weekend.

“We started off the race pretty average. We got a good start, but going into Turn 2, I didn’t have my brakes hot enough and I almost tagged the back of Dani. So I ran wide and then Jorge came past me.

“I knew that this track was going to be hard to overtake on, so I didn’t really want to lose many spots. From there I was just trying to get past Jorge. He was riding well; he was covering his lines well and there weren’t many opportunities.

“But once I got past, we were able to start chasing down Dani and then sort of holding the lap times we knew he could.

“It was such hard work out in front. I was racing to keep the gap, I wasn’t riding to my lap times, I was riding to whoever was behind and just trying to keep that gap and keep the front tyre healthy to the end.

“I knew from the Moto2 race there would be a lot of tyre degradation and I thought if I could just pull a little bit each lap and keep everything as sweet as possible that was the way to do it.  I didn’t stress the tyres too much and kept them for the end.”

Stoner’s commanding victory though didn’t change some of his opinions about the legendary Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

He’s never been a big fan of the circuit and he wasn’t about to become a convert just because he’d claimed his first podium in his fourth attempt on the 2.62 miles track.

He added: “I’m not like some other riders that really enjoy tracks just because they win there. I think I’ve won on most of the circuits that we have on the calendar now. We ride a lot of different tracks around the world, I can’t honestly say this is better than most of them.

“We ride on some fantastic circuits, and we unfortunately don’t go to some of the best ones in the world. I don’t get a kick out of it just because I win on it. Mugello is one of my most favourite circuits, and I think I’ve won there once. I look at what quality the circuit has rather than just memories.

“I think this whole facility and place could be unbelievable, but we use first gear here a lot more than some other circuits. They’re just really tight, twisty, and they’re corners that you don’t push on at all, you just kind of roll around and ride around it.

“That for me is what I don’t like about it. It’s also not meant to be run the way we’re running it. So instead of corners opening up for exits, they just keep tightening up.”

For seven pages of coverage from Indianapolis, see this Wednesday’s copy of MCN.