Lorenzo on his return to action at Laguna Seca

Thursday, 18 July 2013

Yamaha Factory Racing’s Jorge Lorenzo, who only last week re-injured his already broken left collarbone, spoke to motogp.com the evening before the first free practice in Laguna Seca about how he would approach the weekend if passed fit by circuit doctors.

The Spaniard, who had ridden in Assen three weeks ago less than two days after suffering a double broken left collarbone, once again re-damaged the plated injury after a heavy crash in the following round at the Sachsenring. He had initially tweeted that he would sit out the Red Bull U.S. Grand Prix and wait for a full recovery before Indianapolis, but feeling slightly better and with the championship closely bunched, decided to travel to America to race.

He commented: "This is the second operation I got in my left collarbone in a month or even less, so it’s not easy to get out all the inflammation. But anyway, I think I am a little bit better than in Assen - there I had only one day of recovery, and now I’ve had almost one week. So I’m better than in Assen, but worse than in Germany."

On his decision to reverse his statement and come out to race he said: "To be honest, I thought it was over, Laguna Seca….I was tired after so many crashes in little time. And two more injuries! I was thinking to stay calm and stay at home and not go to Laguna. But then of course the crash of Dani, that gave me more chance in the championship – and also I felt much better two days later. This for me changed my mind."

Lorenzo is well aware of the physical nature of the track, yet has past experience of not being in great shape there: "It has a lot of changes in direction, and a lot of up and downhill, and it’s a very short track, so we’re going to make 30 laps or even more. When you are perfect physically it’s very hard to finish the race – imagine you are injured, like I’m going to be these days. But also I’ve got some experience here of riding injured.

"In 2008 I was still injured in my two ankles…I re-broke those two ankles in the first lap. But especially in 2009, I didn’t break the collarbone, but had an injury in the ligament of the collarbone. So I raced in a very bad condition and finished third. And in 2011 I crashed after practice when the traction control didn’t work and I had a bad highside and got injured badly in my hip. So I’ve got experience here in Laguna racing injured."

About whether he has set any concrete goals for the weekend he answered: "We don’t know what my condition will be on the bike. Tomorrow we will see. In Laguna in the morning it is normally very cold and slippery with a lot of fog and humidity. It is best to be very calm, see the other riders first before going on track, and be very progressive. This important thing is not to crash, finish this race and lose the minimum points possible."