German MotoGP: Hayden out of luck on Friday the 13th

Reigning MotoGP world champion Nicky Hayden had a Friday the 13th to forget as he suffered a torrid opening day to the German GP.

Hayden crashed in this morning’s opening free practice session unhurt when he lost the front at Turn 13.

And in the afternoon session he hit more disaster when his factory RC212V motor spectacularly exploded on the start/finish straight. Engine parts including a valve and piston were picked up off the circuit. It was hardly the welcome new HRC president Masumi Hamane would have wanted on his first appearance in the MotoGP paddock as Suguru Kanazawa’s successor.

The fast left-hand corner where Hayden crashed this morning has become treacherously bumpy after a 2007 resurface, with several riders including series leader Casey Stoner and Valentino Rossi expressing their concerns. Rossi said he would bring the issue of the bumps up in this evening’s Safety Commission meeting.

The new surface has created another bump close to one that caused problems last year, and both are in the hard braking area after a flat-out approach from the fast downhill section of the Sachsenring circuit.

Hayden said: “It wasn’t like the bumps just showed up that lap. That corner I wasn’t in any hotter, a little bit more brake but no more speed, then the front end let go. As we’ve seen, there’s no warning. It’s pretty bumpy actually. The track surface looked awesome on a bicycle yesterday, smoother than it was, but it’s worse there, it’s really bumpy down into that corner, though it was always bumpy there. The pavement is a bit inconsistent, some places it’s really good and others it’s bad. There’s one corner top of the hill, I wish I had a harder compound knee slider because it’s biting that much.”

Of his engine failure he said: “I don’t really know what happened but it was pretty terminal. I know I left a lot of the engine lying on the track.”