Fiat Yamaha's Valentino Rossi is hoping his bad luck for the year is over as he goes into this weekend's German MotoGP round at the Sachsenring, where he crashed out last year.
The Italian, who fell on lap three of the Dutch TT, wants a mistake-free second half of the 2008 season and no repeat performance of his crash last year.
He said: “Last year in Sachsenring I made a mistake and crashed, and at the last race in Assen I also made a mistake, so I hope that I’ve now had my bad moment for this year! Sachsenring has been a great track for me in the past and it’s a great place to race at; it’s very tight and twisty but it generally suits the Yamaha very well and in 2006 I had a fantastic race there, winning from 11th.

"We are going there having lost our championship lead but we’re only four points behind so the situation is certainly much better than it was at this point last season. I was disappointed with myself in Assen because I missed a great chance but I have put that behind me and I am completely focused on the next race now. We need to be at 100% from the first practice and hopefully we can have a good weekend with no more mistakes!”
Team-mate Jorge Lorenzo is facing an uphill battle back to full fitness and has now begun to train properly but is feeling the effects.
He said: “I have recently started to train normally again after a gap of two months, which has been quite hard for me and I have been very tired lately! Since the accident in China I haven’t been able to use the exercise bike or do proper cardiovascular work until last week, so I am just having to take my regime step-by-step to try to build my strength.
"I know that building my fitness back up is the best way to return to my former level. Even though it’s been a hard time for me through the last two months I think that the crashes have made me stronger mentally; when you win it’s easy but when things are going badly, this is when you learn more about yourself and this is very important to make you a better competitor. For the next race I have to keep trying to build my confidence with the bike. Sachsenring is a complicated track and my best result there is only third, but I don’t think about statistics when I race. I just want to arrive at Sachsenring feeling relaxed and do my best to enjoy it.”