3 Things We Learned This Weekend – Rossi, Paddon and Loeb

Rossi’s super seventh at Jerez

Almost sixteen years since he first stood atop a top-class motorcycle grand prix podium – at Donington Park in July 2000 – Valentino Rossi is still a winning machine. The 37-year-old Italian yesterday romped to an easy win at Jerez in round four of the MotoGP championship, putting one over Honda nemesis Marc Marquez and Yamaha team-mate Jorge Lorenzo. And his 113^th victory across the 125/250/500cc/MotoGP spectrum came after he’d hooked up the YZR-M1 perfectly to secure his umpteenth pole and set the quickest lap of the race.

His seventh win at the Spanish biking equivalent of Mecca, to add to his 500cc victory in 2001 and MotoGP wins in 2002, 2003, 2005, 2007 and 2009, keeps him in the hunt for a 10^th world title and edging ever closer to 15-time World Champion Giacomo Agostini’s record Grand Prix haul of 122 wins.

Paddon puts the Kiwis on the WRC map

In Argentina yesterday, Hyundai’s Hayden Paddon added his name to the list of World Championship rally winners. The 29-year-old New Zealander became the 76^th driver to win in rallying’s premier class since it began in 1973, – and he did it in only his 23rd start in a World Rally-specification car.

Paddon first competed in the WRC in 2007, at the wheel of a Group N Mitsubishi, soon graduating to Group A machinery in the shape of a Subaru Impreza and Skoda Fabia S2000. His big break came in Catalunya in 2013, when he finished eighth in an M-Sport Ford Fiesta RS WRC.

That performance put him firmly on the radar of returning factory team Hyundai, the Korean manufacturer entrusting him with a part programme in its i20 WRC. Some strong results across 2014 and ’15 confirmed his hot-property status and he was rewarded with a move into a full-time role for 2016.

Second in Sweden earlier in the year and fifth in Mexico last time out kept up the pressure on Paddon. Once VW’s Jari-Matti Latvala had crashed out of the lead in Argentina, Paddon kept his cool and held off triple World Champion Sébastien Ogier for that breakthrough win. And I doubt it’ll be his last.

Loeb wins in WTCC – from the pitwall

Nine-time World Rally Champion Sébastien Loeb, who moved into circuit racing with Citroën and the World Touring Championship, is now making a decent fist of life as a team owner in the FIA-sanctioned tin-top series. Having started off in GT racing, Sébastien Loeb Racing joined the WTCC in 2015, running Moroccan racer Mehdi Bennani to a podium finish in a Citroën C-Elysee, while the boss took four wins for the works Citroën squad.

Now armed with three of the dominant C-Elysees and a year’s experience under its belt, SLR is expecting to be a frontrunner. And that forecast has thus far proved accurate thanks to a one-two in the opening race in Hungary last weekend. Polesitter Bennani led home Briton Tom Chilton at the Hungaroring, with team owner Loeb proudly presiding over the effort.

Feature image courtesy of Dorna/MotoGP