Sachsenring MotoGP: Valentino Rossi expected more than ninth

Valentino Rossi admitted he was disappointed not to have capitalised on Ducati’s previous strong wet weather performances in Germany today after he ended a rain-lashed Sachsenring qualifying session in a lowly ninth position.

Rossi’s best ever Ducati result came in the wet at Le Mans earlier this season and torrential rain throughout today’s qualifying appeared to be a heaven sent gift for the Italian.

But his GP12 wasn’t the competitive force in today’s monsoon conditions like it was in France and a lack of rear grip on corner entry left him on the third row with a best time of 1.33.217.

The 33-year-old was 1.421s adrift of Casey Stoner’s Repsol Honda RC213V and the nine-times world champion told MCN: “We expected more from the wet session because usually we are more competitive but we made mistake with the setting after the morning session.  With the amount of water in the afternoon I had some problems in the fast part, especially in T2 and T3 and I didn’t have enough rear grip. I was quite fast in T1 and T4 but I lose too much in the other sections. I didn’t have enough rear grip in corner entry and it is a mix between the spring and the position of the bike, so when I enter I had lot of sliding and I lose speed. I’m quite positive we can fix this for the wet because it is very clear. I am ninth but we expected more but the problem is quite clear from the data, so we can adjust this for the race and in case of a wet race we will be quite competitive. The forecast says dry and this is a question mark because we have only done one practice in the dry. Hopefully the warm-up is also dry to understand the setting and tyre choice.”