Motorcycle Forums

MCN interview?

Did MCN actually conduct this interview or did they just slap their name on it?

nostrodamus

After all I did for Yamaha they put in the team a very strong team-mate so I was p****d off with Yamaha more than him"

Then rossi says ". Now it is a different situation and I understand that Yamaha made the right choice for Yamaha. This is not a big problem.”

Poor Vale was left with no option to pick up his bat and slouch off to the red corner where his true skill level has been brutally exposed.

Spoken like a true bitter twisted aussie stoner lover.

Rossi is a

great rider. No denying it. But he can't ride that Ducati in it's current form. Even Hayden who has had a few more seasons on it struggles from time to time. Yes Stoner did OK I think due to his brutal riding style. The bike is at fault. All any fan of Moto GP should want is Rossi back fighting at the front not fighting for control of his bike. As a fan of the sport I would love to see Rossi winning on a Ducati for the achievement of winning races on all three factory team bikes. But I can't see it. Really any true fan of the sport should want loads of people at the front fighting for a podium. Dare I say MotoGP is getting a little F1-ish. Stale and predictable.

Interesting theory CH

After 2 years of stagnation, why would they want to continue to pay him this huge 'consultancy fee' when Hayden is getting more out of the bike and finally got the result he deserved (in terms of Ducati positions)

But is that Ducati really such an outright dog?

Is it possible they could still get someone else who could make more of it?

Hayden, who no-one seems to rate as a winner (in the same terms as say Lorenzo, Stoner, Pedrosa) was running lap times very similar to the Tech3 bikes and not far off Spies (granted, we don't know if his times were affected by his bike, but he had picked his pace up for the few laps before his crash, so assume not)

Saying that Hayden's pace was similar to the Tech3 bikes may not sound any great shakes when it is a factory bike, but, the Yamaha is a very capable well rounded bike, even in satellite form and appears to be the class of the field.

So, if Hayden can get the Ducati on the same pace as the Tech3 bikes and just shy of the pace of one of the Factory Yams, is it fair to assume that a better rider could place the bike higher? The rationale for that is that we see what the Factory Yam is capable of with Lorenzo on it, but if it was just Spies we wouldn't. Ditto the Ducati, if Hayden can run the lap times he was, could someone else do better?

Are we seeing the full potential of the Ducati.

I don't buy it Bultoboy

Why it is an interesting question, I think the Ducati isn't a match for the Honda or Yamaha no matter the rider. It just hasn't had the amount of work, fine tuning, and development as the Jap bikes. Yamaha and Honda have been working on their 1000cc bikes since the beginning of last year. Ducati has started over like 2 or 3 times since then. They took their first 1000cc bike they were testing and stuff an 800cc in it and named it the GP11.1 or something. I really don't recall them doing any other 1000cc test after that until the end of season test at Valencia. And at Valencia they had a new 1000cc with the twin beam frame. And then after Christmas they said they had another bike that was "90%" new or something. And this weekend was the first time we even heard of them getting any new updates since preseason. I can't see how their bike can be on par with Yamaha and Honda.