Sepang, 19 October 2008: LCR Honda MotoGP rider Randy De Puniet made a positive race at the 5.548 Km Sepang circuit today starting from the third row and getting the 10th final place. The penultimate round of the season at the Malaysian circuit was held in very hot conditions with air temperature of 39°C whilst the asphalt temperature rose up to 42°C.

The Frenchman aboard the Michelin-shod Honda RC212V qualified tenth in this morning warm up session and was confident ahead the 21-lap race but Randy did not make a perfect start finishing the first lap in 13th position. Despite the tropical heat and the injured right wrist, the 27-year-old managed to finish the race in the top-ten. The LCR team will now move to Spain for the last round of the season at Valencia circuit.

De Puniet – 10th : “At the start I released the clutch to early and did a big wheeling loosing a few positions. After the first lap I started to set my rhythm and was pretty comfortable despite the heat. I enjoyed battling with Toseland because he passed me twice and I did the same with him but at the end he crashed. Then I caught Hopkins and passed him in the fifth lap pushing hard to catch the first group. My pace was pretty fast but I took a big risk in the last corner at four laps to go and preferred to reduce the speed. In the middle of the race my right wrist started to ache a lot and was very hard for me to change directions and to brake in the corners”.


Race:

1 Rossi
2 Pedrosa
3 Dovizioso
4 Hayden
5 Nakano
6 Stoner
7 Capirossi
8 Edwards
9 Vermeulen
10 De Puniet
11 Hopkins
12 West
13 Guintoli
14 De Angelis
15 Elias
16 Melandri
17 Aoki

OUT: Toseland, Lorenzo