Repsol Honda's Dani Pedrosa has pulled out of the USGP at Laguna Seca. He sat out of the third free practice session this morning after taking part yesterday while in considerable pain.
In his initial practice runs he had been using a specially adapted glove, between-session massages and painkilling injections, but even these measures were not enough to help him finish any higher than fifteenth on the combined timesheets. His best time from Friday was a 1´23.707, over two seconds slower than that recorded by pacesetter Casey Stoner in the most recent session.
“It was a difficult decision to make whether to return home or not, but this time nothing else was possible. Yesterday I suffered a lot in the two sessions," said Pedrosa.

"In the morning I realised that without a pain-killing injection I could not ride and in the afternoon, after the injection, I still felt a lot of pain. In the afternoon I only did a set of nine consecutive laps, but they seemed like 40. This morning I got up feeling even more pain, with my fingers swollen and I know thatIi could not have finished the race.

"Standing up to 32 laps in these conditions is impossible; above all at this circuit, with so many ups and downs, heavy braking and so many left hand curves, that is precisely the hand that is injured. At least I have the consolation of having tried, and the result is something I would never have known if I had stayed at home. Now I have three weeks to recover and so try to go to Brno in the best physical condition."