Ducati designer praises Yamaha response

Ducati’s technical boss Filippo Preziosi has praised Yamaha for the way the Japanese factory has retaliated against Casey Stoner’s 2007 domination.

In the opening six races of 2008, Yamaha has been the dominant force with four wins, five pole positions and ten podiums with Valentino Rossi returning to his best form.

It is a stark contrast to last year when Yamaha was arguably the worst performing manufacturer in the new 800cc era, and such was Rossi’s frustration that he threatened to quit unless he got a faster and more reliable Yamaha YZR-M1 machine in 2008.

The 29-year-old got his wishes and he’s now won the last three races, while Ducati has only won one race and Stoner is already 46-points behind Rossi with a third of the season completed.

But Preziosi admitted that credit had to be given to Yamaha and he said: “I know that are competitors are really strong. We made a big surprise last year to them but we know very well they are 250 times bigger than us and they have all the resources to close the gap and they did.

“I have to congratulate them, especially to Yamaha and Honda for the job they did. But I am sure even Suzuki and Kawasaki have the resources and the technical capabilities and the riders to perform very well.

“Of course we like to win and we are upset because we were not winning as we would like. Unfortunately everyone wants to win and only one can. But you can only push at 100 per cent like the others are doing.”

Preziosi said it was obvious the huge step Yamaha engineers had made with the YZR-M1 when Rossi, Jorge Lorenzo and Colin Edwards took a clean sweep of the podium in last month’s French MotoGP.

Preziosi added: “I must congratulate Yamaha because they did a fantastic job putting three riders in the podium. This is the best thing for a manufacturer.

“This means you are also good in choosing good riders. Valentino has seven titles, Jorge (Lorenzo) has two and Colin (Edwards) and James (Toseland) have two World Superbike titles, so they have 13 world championships between them.”