After this morning's practice sessions, the FIM announced an amendment to Rule 1.25.4 of the Road Racing World Championship Grand Prix Regulations concerning re-starts of red-flagged races. In a highly unusual move, the FIM directed that the new rule will become effective immediately. The press release promulgated by the FIM indicated that the decision had been made on Wednesday, June 26. However, the release was not issued until Friday afternoon, June 28, and the riders and teams were apparently unaware of the change until the distribution of the official release.

According to the new rule, if a MotoGP race is red-flagged at any time, it will be re-started unless "it is found impossible" to do so. Cumulative times will determine the result. By contrast, the 125cc and 250cc classes retain the rule that previously applied to all three classes: if a race is red-flagged after two-thirds distance, the race will be deemed complete and full championship points awarded.

At the post-qualifying press conference, the top qualifiers expressed dismay at the last minute change. Rossi, Kenny Roberts Jr., and Loris Capirossi agreed that a restart with several laps remaining should not be problematic, but that a two or three lap sprint could create a dangerous situation. Only Max Biaggi, who won last year's Assen TT when the race was red-flagged and declared complete due to rain, said simply "I think?I'm okay."

All four riders were perturbed by the FIM's failure to consult the riders or its own safety representative before promulgating the rule. Valentino Rossi said, "This is incredible. Changing the rule today is already strange, but if it's better, it's okay. But why not speak with the riders? Never. This is the biggest problem. If they spoke with us, maybe we would decide together, or we don't. But we know [about the change] through the journalists. Like always."

Roberts wanted "to know who made the rule and why they made the rule. We need to have somebody up there that has raced and has a little bit of experience in that area, I think, to make the calls and the right decision." Before cutting his comments short, Biaggi began "Well, it's been changed only a few hours ago. And we didn't know that." Capirossi perhaps described the situation best when he said, "I think everybody's waiting to understand what happened."

Rossi felt that a rider representative, someone chosen by the riders but without the responsibilities of racing, should consult with the FIM. "Because Luccini, he's for the safety, but he works for the other?side. This is an old problem."

In closing, Roberts emphasized that the FIM had "been quite good listening to us on track safety and our voice within the paddock. So I think that Valentino's right, we need to find somebody that can do that. But also, it's not just this one instance. We need to find out why they changed it and why we weren't alerted to the change and not asked for our opinion. But anyway, they've done a good job up til now, and we just have to find out the reasons. But they can probably justify the reasons they made the rule change."