Source: MotoGP.

Australia’s lone MotoGP regular Broc Parkes is celebrating a debut point in the MotoGP World Championship, finishing 15th at Qatar’s season opener last month.

It was a memorable weekend for the experienced 32-year-old, making his first grand prix appearance 15 years following his Australian 125cc Grand Prix wildcard in 1999 at Phillip Island.

“I am well happy for the boys,” Parkes told MotoGP.com. “It’s pretty cool to score a point in your first GP – it has brought the whole team up. Things haven’t been very easy lately because we were quite late getting the bikes together and the whole program was a bit delayed.

“The guys have been working double time to try and get it all ready. It is a real relief for them and we have begun the season on a positive note.”

Parkes admits it was a long shot to score debut points in the premier class, and he wasn’t actually aware of his final finishing position until post-race after Alvaro Bautista crashed out on the penultimate lap.

“We had a bit of a count on Saturday to see where I was on the grid, how many people I could finish in front of and how many had to go out in order to score a point,” he continues. “It was a very long shot! We always try and dream about it, of course.

“Suddenly, at one point in the race I saw on the pit board that I was P16 and towards the end I thought to myself, ‘wow, if just one more guy goes out we’re on for a point!’. But that 16 stayed on my board for the whole race, just one position off the points.

“Then I get back to the pit lane. Birdy [Paul Bird, team owner] grabs me in the box and says ‘you scored a point!’.”

PBM’s earning of a world championship point in Qatar was its first since Yonny Hernandez finished 15th at Laguna Seca last year.