1990 Japanese motorcycle Grand Prix

  1990 Japanese Grand Prix

Race details
Race 1 of 15 races in the 1990 Grand Prix motorcycle racing season
Date	25 March 1990
Official name	Kibun Japanese Grand Prix [1] [2] [3]
Location	Suzuka Circuit
Course	Permanent racing facility 5.821 km (3.617 mi)
500 cc
Pole position Rider Wayne Rainey Time 2:09.589 Fastest lap Rider Wayne Rainey Time 2:11.354 Podium First Wayne Rainey Second Wayne Gardner Third Kevin Schwantz
250 cc
Pole position Rider John Kocinski Time 2:14.273 Fastest lap Rider Jacques Cornu Time 2:16.452 Podium First Luca Cadalora Second Carlos Cardús Third Wilco Zeelenberg
125 cc
Pole position Rider Kinya Wada Time 2:25.033 Fastest lap Rider Stefan Prein Time 2:25.045 Podium First Hans Spaan Second Stefan Prein Third Koji Takada

The 1990 Japanese motorcycle Grand Prix was the first round of the 1990 Grand Prix motorcycle racing season. It took place on the weekend of 23–25 March 1990 at the Suzuka Circuit.

500 cc race report

Wayne Rainey's pole of 2:09.589 is the first sub-2:10 lap at Suzuka. Rainey gets the start of the new 4-column grid, followed by Mick Doohan, Eddie Lawson and the field. Rainey goes through the chicane with a sub-second gap, followed by Lawson, Doohan, Kevin Schwantz and Wayne Gardner.

Rainey is opening a gap, but Schwantz moves into second and leads the chase. Entering the back straight, Schwantz looks behind him to see who's back there, but Lawson's proximity probably blocks the view.

Perhaps Schwantz had a feeling something bad was about to happen. Going into 130R, Gardner barely manages to pass on the brakes and move into second place, while Doohan brakes for all he's worth, getting the back wheel in the air, and loses the front end as he leans it in. Unfortunately, he's inside of Lawson when he falls, so Doohan's bike hits Lawson's rear wheel hard, taking him out too. Lawson, who came out of 1989 without a race crash, begins the season with a DNF and a broken left ankle.

Rainey has a large gap, and Gardner and Schwantz are scraping fairings for second. Last lap and Rainey has an untouchable lead, and Gardner goes slightly wide heading towards the chicane, but manages to hold Schwantz off; as they flick it right and then left, Schwantz touches Gardner's back tire and drops his bike. Because it happened at such a low speed, Schwantz is able to get back on quickly and still cross the line in third place.

Schwantz: "I thought I had Gardner sorted out pretty good for the last lap going into the chicane, just as soon as I got up the inside and he saw my wheel he came in and I think he was still going in too fast. He went into the chicane real deep. I got turned quick because I knew he was going to be wide. He came back across and as I was coming down , we hit. I guess it all depends on how you look at it as to who's fault it was I'd say it was his." ^[4]

500 cc classification

Pos.	No.	Rider	Team	Manufacturer	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Points
1	2	Wayne Rainey	Marlboro Team Roberts	Yamaha	22	48:52.475	1	20
2	10	Wayne Gardner	Rothmans Honda Team	Honda	22	+3.237	3	17
3	34	Kevin Schwantz	Lucky Strike Suzuki	Suzuki	22	+15.556	2	15
4	4	Kevin Magee	Lucky Strike Suzuki	Suzuki	22	+40.689	7	13
5	6	Sito Pons	Campsa Banesto	Honda	22	+41.008	9	11
6	21	Tadahiko Taira	Tech 21	Yamaha	22	+51.363	10	10
7	5	Pierfrancesco Chili	Team ROC Elf La Cinq	Honda	22	+51.536	6	9
8	14	Jean-Philippe Ruggia	Sonauto Gauloises	Yamaha	22	+53.739	15	8
9	39	Shinichi Itoh	Team HRC	Honda	22	+1:02.515	8	7
10	11	Juan Garriga	Ducados Yamaha	Yamaha	22	+1:25.526	18	6
11	37	Hikaru Miyagi	Teera	Honda	22	+1:29.184	20	5
12	41	Shinji Katayama	UCC	Yamaha	22	+1:42.002	21	4
13	38	Osamu Hiwatashi	Schick Advantage	Suzuki	22	+1:42.713	19	3
Ret	43	Keiji Ohishi		Yamaha	18	Retirement	22
Ret	18	Randy Mamola	Cagiva Corse	Cagiva	18	Retirement	17
Ret	28	Alex Barros	Cagiva Corse	Cagiva	12	Retirement	24
Ret	40	Satoshi Tsujimoto		Suzuki	9	Retirement	13
Ret	3	Christian Sarron	Sonauto Gauloises	Yamaha	8	Retirement	11
Ret	8	Ron Haslam	Cagiva Corse	Cagiva	8	Retirement	23
Ret	36	Kunio Machii		Yamaha	7	Retirement	12
Ret	1	Eddie Lawson	Marlboro Team Roberts	Yamaha	4	Retirement	4
Ret	9	Mick Doohan	Rothmans Honda Team	Honda	4	Retirement	5
Ret	15	Norihiko Fujiwara	Yamaha Motor Company	Yamaha	2	Retirement	16
DNS	35	Shunji Yatsushiro	YS Racing	Honda		Did not start	14
DNQ	26	Nicholas Schmassman	Team Schmassman	Honda		Did not qualify
DNQ	44	Kenmei Matsumoto	Meikoh	Honda		Did not qualify
Sources: [5] [6]

References

1. "Grand Prix uitslagen en bijzonderheden 1990". 25 July 2015. Archived from the original on 25 July 2015.
2. Mitchell, Malcolm. "1990 500cc Class (FIM Grand Prix World Championship) Programmes - The Motor Racing Programme Covers Project". www.progcovers.com.
3. Mitchell, Malcolm. "Suzuka Circuit - The Motor Racing Programme Covers Project". www.progcovers.com.
4. Schwantz, Kevin: Blurred Past Archived 2006-05-19 at the Wayback Machine kevinschwantz.com 1994.
5. "1990 Japanese MotoGP - Motor Sport Magazine Database". 13 June 2017.
6. "motogp.com · JAPANESE GRAND PRIX · 500cc Race Classification 1990". www.motogp.com.

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