The Nürburgring (Germany) : Ducati Xerox factory rider Noriyuki Haga returned to winning ways today, with a stunning victory in Race 2 at the Nurburgring. Team-mate Michel Fabrizio was not so fortunate, forced to retire from both races.

The factory pair had made a determined start to race day, closing the early morning warm-up in second (Fabrizio) and third (Haga) position.

The start of Race 1 did not go to plan however when Leon Haslam and Troy Corser fell at the first corner, causing a red flag and a restart of the race half an hour later, with riders reverting to their original grid positions. Noriyuki got away well, moving up to third place through the first corner. Quickly passing Carlos Checa on the privateer Ducati, the Japanese rider held second position until the end of the seventh lap when he unexpectedly lost the front of his machine. Unhurt, he hoped to be able to return to the track and returned to the box to fix a damaged handlebar but unfortunately damaged mufflers meant that it was too dangerous to continue and the team decided to retire.

Haga’s team-mate Fabrizio was no luckier in the first race. Having lost a couple of positions at the start, he quickly made these back up, to find himself seventh after two laps. Unfortunately, however, during lap four, Michel too came off, losing the front; he managed to get back on the bike and was beginning to make up ground until throttle damage caused during the crash made it impossible to continue and forced the Italian rider to return to the garage.

Source: http://www.ducatipress.com/index.php?id=173

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