"Wooden medal" - Diggia jokes about Valentino Rossi helmet after Brno MotoGP podium miss
Two fourth-place finishes at Brno left Fabio di Giannantonio joking about reviving one of Valentino Rossi's most famous helmets - MotoGP title battle "completely open".
The fastest rider on track in the closing laps of the Brno MotoGP, Fabio di Giannantonio ran out of time to attack Pecco Bagnaia and was left with a pair of fourth-place finishes for the weekend.
That prompted the VR46 rider to joke that he should wear team owner Valentino Rossi’s famous ‘wooden medal’ helmet from Mugello 2004.
“I'm going home with the wooden medals of P4-P4. So maybe next race I will use the Vale helmet of Mugello some years ago!” di Giannantonio said.
Rossi famously unveiled the wood-medal design after his podium run came to an end ahead of Mugello 2004.
The Doctor explained at the time: "In Italy we have a joke that if you come fourth you get a wooden medal. After 23 podiums in a row, I arrived fourth for the last two races, so we decided to make a wooden-looking helmet design with a four on the front!"
Rossi then took the helmet to victory in his home race.
Reflecting on his Brno results, di Giannantonio said: “For sure, in a championship this long, P4s are super important if you cannot do [better]. So it's a positive weekend in that sense because we recovered a lot of points.”
“The championship is completely open”
With title leader Marco Bezzecchi failing to score after a Sprint crash and Sunday suspension, top Ducati rider di Giannantonio is now just 23 points from the top of the standings.
"The championship is completely open, there's a race [weekend] and a half between first and seventh,” he told Sky Italia.
That one-and-a-half race weekends' worth of points (55.5) now covers Bezzecchi, Jorge Martin, di Giannantonio, Marc Marquez, Ai Ogura, Pedro Acosta and Bagnaia.
Returning to his own race, di Giannantonio, who crossed the line only 0.169s behind Bagnaia after setting a new record on the final lap, was left to regret an early mistake.
“I made a mistake on the first lap when Marc overtook me. I really wanted to be in front,” di Giannantonio said.
“So that lack of patience got me going early on the throttle on turn 3 and I lost the rear, I lost momentum, and I lost a lot of places. That is where I ruined my race.
“Then for sure, coming back is always spectacular. A great show, good to set a new race lap record, but there are no points for that.
“I have to be better; I have to learn.”
"A bit of yoga"
The Italian admitted he still doesn't feel fully comfortable with the GP26 during the opening laps of races.
“It's true that in the full race, I always struggle a little bit on the early laps. We are also trying to understand with the bike what we can do because the balance changes quite a lot from the beginning to the end. I'm much faster at the end. But apart from this, I think today it was just a lack of patience.”
Asked how he could improve that weakness, di Giannantonio smiled: “Doing a little bit of yoga at home!”
The Dutch TT at Assen begins on Friday.
Peter has been in the paddock for 20 years and has seen Valentino Rossi come and go. He is at the forefront of the Suzuki exit story and Marc Marquez’s injury issues.
