News

Melandri: I must make sure for misano

21/08/07

By David Miller

Gresini Honda's Marco Melandri is determined to be fit for the next MotoGP round at Misano next weekend despite having a herniated disc in his neck and still suffering from his broken ankle.

The Italian was forced to pull out of last weekend's Brno round after he suffered severe pain down his left side just ten laps into Friday free practice. He was struggling to even put his crash helment on in the pits.

“It was frustrating having to watch the race from the pit wall, especially having worked really hard over the summer to recover from the broken ankle," he said. "My neck has been in some pain ever since Laguna Seca but I never thought it would stop me from racing here at Brno.

"Unfortunately on Friday morning I had a hernia between the C5 and C6 vertebrae which put pressure on the nerve and I lost all strength in my left arm and hand. Now my only thought is to get fit as soon as possible and make sure I am ready to race again at Misano.”

Team-mate Toni Elias managed a 13th place  at the weekend at about 60 per cent fitness and is still recovering from his Assen crash where he broke a femur.

“I’m really proud and satisfied to have finished the race. Considering my physical condition, eleventh place is not bad," said Elias. "Brno features a lot of direction changes and it’s very demanding on the body so I struggled a lot with the pain in my leg. Now we have two more weeks of hard work ahead to try and recover as well as possible and be ready for Misano, my team’s home race. In fact, the headquarters are just a few kilometres away in San Clemente.”