Sitting 17 points behind the championship leader four races into the 2013 season, reigning world champion Jorge Lorenzo maintains that Yamaha Factory Racing must remain composed in order to claw back the difference.

This weekend’s fifth round of the season takes the teams and riders to Mugello in Tuscany, where Lorenzo has won the Gran Premio d’Italia TIM for the past two years. He hopes to achieve the hat trick in 2013, having finished seventh last time out.

"I'm looking forward to visiting Mugello after suffering a very disappointing weekend at Le Mans," he says, reflecting on a French Grand Prix in which he plummeted back through the field with setup issues and a lack of rear grip.

"It was a tough race for us and I want to recover points at Mugello - a good track for me. I like the circuit a lot because of its layout: plenty of long and high-speed corners. I have a lot of good memories there and I would like to have a positive weekend. I also think this is a good place for Yamaha to get the best performance.

"The only weak point for us is the long straight, where maybe our rivals are stronger than us, but in general the track is very suited to our bike. I can’t wait to go to Italy and be on the pace. We need to cut away the gap to the front but, anyway, the championship is long so we have to be calm."

After four races last year, Lorenzo led the championship by eight points from Casey Stoner. He now sits third overall behind Repsol Honda Team’s Dani Pedrosa and Marc Marquez, who are 17 and 11 points in front respectively.

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