Mugello MotoGP: Neck pain troubles Casey Stoner

A neck injury picked up during a nasty crash during last weekend’s Assen MotoGP round hampered Repsol Honda’s Casey Stoner during a rain-hit practice at the Mugello track earlier today.

The Australian was surprisingly slow in the early stages of this morning’s practice session, which was run in gloriously sunny conditions.

It later emerged the 2007 world champion was struggling with a lingering neck injury after he crashed on a damp patch at the historic Assen circuit a week ago.

Once he’d got more comfortable on his factory RC212V machine he was able to set a time of 1.49.027. That looked like securing him top spot until home favourite Marco Simoncelli thrilled the Italian fans with a lap of 1.48.987 in the dying seconds to deny Stoner.

Stoner didn’t even ride this afternoon as light rain fell intermittently during the second session and he said: “Simoncelli was pretty fast this morning and I had a few problems at the start of the session. I’ve had some problems with pain in my shoulder from the crash in Assen and it has moved into my neck and it’s been getting worse. In the morning session it was painful and a little bit scary in the first few minutes.”

Expanding on the injury, Stoner added: “It is not a fracture, just a pinched muscle or nerve so it took some time to warm up and I couldn’t look to the left and when I went on the brakes my neck was nearly touching the tank because I didn’t have any strength in it.  I changed my style for the hard braking areas and considering I wasn’t comfortable the lap times came quite easy and for me this track is great.”

Stoner also played down the impact the neck injury will have on his chances of claiming a fifth win in eight races in 2011.

He goes into this weekend’s Italian Grand Prix with a healthy 28-point lead over closest rival Jorge Lorenzo and he said: “I won’t be 100 per cent but you don’t need to be 100 per cent to ride at this level, you can always put the pain at the back of your mind.  When the pain is bad it is difficult and this morning I couldn’t turn to the left.  I changed my style, stayed lower behind the screen to take less pressure off my head and I’m sure I’ll be fine.”