MotoGP Blog

The riders and teams arrive in Northern Italy seemingly in advance of the avalanche of rider moves waiting to be announced. Melandri unexpectedly pre-empted the start of the avalanche with his announcement of a move to Kawasaki. As the weekend in Misano approaches ever closer, this seems like a Ducati stage-managed move to clear the air in advance of the Bologna factory’s announcement of the arrival of Nicky Hayden for the 2009 season. As close as it gets to a home race for the Red team, this is the opportunity to announce such a coup-de-grace: two recent world champions in the one team. Ducati can hardly have believed they would achieve so much in just six seasons.

Once Hayden’s move is announced, probably much to Honda’s distaste, the field opens. Dovizioso, Bautista, Elias, Guintoli, even Vermeulen’s future may become more more clear before Sunday evening finally arrives. Before then, though, there is a race to be won. Last year saw Stoner win by a mile and Bridgestone again bitch-slap Michelin, something which Michelin will be trying very hard to prevent happening again. Rossi’s early exit was a massive anti-climax for the Yellow Hoards and there will be more than 46 fingers crossed for a different result this year. We also had extra-ordinary weather on the Friday, casting doubt on the entire event.

For the sake of the championship, it would be good to see a Stoner victory. For the sake of the race, it would be better to see Rossi, Pedrosa and Stoner battle it out as they have all season, injuries and tyres allowing. Pedrosa is the long shot of these three, but with Ducati and Rossi with home advantage, calling the winner is for a better man than I.

You can find your Misano crib sheet here. Last year we had extra-ordinary storms and Stoner, will this year be the same?

Kawasaki have announced that they will run a satellite bike in 2009, with the cash coming from a Spanish telecoms company: 1188. The details are laid out at Autosport, and it looks like team manager Batholemy wants to hang on to West.

The decision might be out of Batholemy’s hands, however. The new team will be run by Jorge ‘Aspar’ Martinez and, given his close ties with Bautista, this could be the vehicle by which the young Spanish rider makes the leap to MotoGP. Aspar has made the rounds looking for a bike to get his very successful outfit into MotoGP - Ducati, Suzuki and Yamaha have all been visited by Aspar, but his ability to bring the sponsorship cash of 1188 appears to have finally swung the deal with Kawasaki. Aspar’s great relationship with Bautista is well known, and the Spanish sponsor completes the all-Spanish line-up.

Best start looking elsewhere Ant.

Marco Melandri has rather prematurely announced he will move to Kawasaki for the 2009 season, blabbing the move to MotoGP.com. He had been linked to a return to Gresini to try and replicate his prior success. Melandri claims to be riding alongside Hopkins next year, but MotoGPBlog understands the move is not yet confirmed by Kawasaki Japan, although the team manager and Melandri himself have agreed terms.

All this is bad news for Ant West who can expect to exit stage left, or if he is very lucky he may pick up a satellite Honda ride, given the expected shuffle of Hayden to Ducati and Dovizioso to Repsol Honda. Alternatively there may be an LCR Honda vacant if de Puniet does not hold on to his place.

Rossi yesterday stated he thought Yamaha had closed the gap to Ducati, and with a win under his belt and new parts to test on his Yamaha to provide more tractable power, this seemed sensible. He was quoted as saying:

For me, the problem (at Brno) is that he made a 1:57.2 lap and he saw that it was not possible to pull away, so he tried to make 1:56.0, and in the human world that is not possible.

Well, Valentino, a 1:56 may well be possible. On Monday in testing Stoner pulled a 1:56.261, comfortably inside the lap record he set in the race on Sunday, and a full 1.1 seconds faster than Rossi managed with his new engine parts and electronics. Tuesday’s results will clarify the picture a little as Yamaha and Ducati get to the end of their programme of tests, but Ducati say they found this speed as a result of a simple set-up change.

The race for the championship is not over yet.

UPDATE: Stoner today managed a 1:55.904 on race tyres to Rossi’s 1:56.613.

The grid was hugely influenced by the tyre situation, the front dominated by Bridgestone runners. Michelin struggled to find a front tyre with the right composition to cope with the beating handed out by the MotoGP bikes around Brno.

Aside from tyre complaints, before the race, all the talk was of a resumption of the scrap in Laguna Seca between Rossi and Stoner. As it happens, there would be signs of this battle, but things would change through the race and the result sheet would, with one exception, look like it had been turned on it’s head.

The first laps were standard fare. Stoner lead from the off, immediately establishing a lead over the rest of the field, his speed in all the sessions leading up to this one clearly on show. Rossi failed to get the start he had in Laguna and slipped back the third position behind Hopkins.

Meanwhile tussles further down the order led to some unusual, but most welcome placings. At the end of the first lap, Stoner headed Rossi by a staggering 1.1 seconds, and the Kawasakis of Hopkins and West were in hot pursuit a further 1.3 seconds back. Vermeulen, Pedrosa and Dovizioso were next over the line. The back end of the field was dominated by unhappy Michelin riders: Edwards, Toseland, and Lorenzo, the exception being the sad figure of Melandri keeping them company.

So it went for the next five laps. Rossi pegged Stoner’s lead at a comfortable (for Stoner) 1.8 seconds, and Hopkins, West, Vermeulen, Capirossi, Dovizioso and de Puniet tussled for third to eighth places, a further five seconds back. Dark horse Elias started to join the fray in this period, gaining a couple of places from his grid position of 13th in the first lap, and gaining a place a lap and by the end of lap 5 holding a staggering 6th place and running in the 1:58s - the fastest runner outside of the front two.

Suddenly and without warning, disaster struck for Stoner. Rossi would later claim that his pressure forced the error from Casey, and Ducati have been mute as to the cause of his fall; judging by the TV pictures it looked like Stoner leant his Ducati over too far, ground a footpeg and lost traction at the front resulting in a low-side. This left Rossi free to maintain his 16 second gap for the remainder of the race, a pack fighting it out tooth and nail for the remaining two podium places.

First of the casualties from the bunch: Pedrosa. Suffering with his injuries and poor grip from his Michelins, he was to drop to 15th place and gain only a single point. Second, Hopkins dropped out of the running, this time a Bridgestone front feeling the pace and the still-recovering Hopkins lacking the physical strength in his leg to ride around the problem.

Surging through the pack in a massive turn-about in form was Elias, fighting through to second place - and not just by a small margin, but by almost seven seconds by the chequered flag. Was this the first fruit of the increased influence of the Ducati team on the Alice squad following the departure of d’Antin?

Third, and claiming the final place on the podium was a resurgent Capirossi, equalling this weekend the record number of GP starts - 276 in total. He finished the day with some other significant statistics: his 99th career podium and his 1st podium for Suzuki.

Nakano made the most of his new equipment, bringing the 2008-spec factory bike (with spring valves) home fourth. West also had a fantastic race, his best of the season and his best placing in his MotoGP career with a sterling fifth place, pushing Elias all the way for the ride of the weekend. He and Hopkins made the most of the new Kawasaki frame and engine mods and perhaps gave us a glimpse of what we can expect from the team next year.

Vermeulen was left wondering why he didn’t do better - tyres were the answer, his set going off after only seven laps, making it obvious that it was not just the Michelins that struggled in the race. Also picking up some decent points and making his retention in the team a valid decision was Melandri, scrapping on the last couple of laps with de Angelis and Dovizioso and coming off the victor.

Uncharacteristically trailing at the back of the race were the Tech 3 boys, never able to put in a decent lap all weekend for one reason or another, be it weather or tyres, Toseland in particular made his feelings about his rubber choices known and promising to dig in and work harder to succeed.

MotoGPBlog Man of the Weekend: Tony Elias for a stunning ride from 13th on the grid to 2nd.

Cold, wet and seemingly typical of many sessions this season, the racers took to a track which was holding a temperature of just 13C. This was measured at the start of a session in which the conditions simply got worse. So wet was it that the newly laid tarmac gave the appearance of a calm lake. As a result, all the decent times were set in the first 25 minutes, after which all the riders struggled to get any sort of heat or feel from the tyres.

Stoner put in a 2.11.6 early on. It was not bettered throughout the session.

Early showings from Vermeulen, de Angelis and Capirossi were encouraging, despite Capirex having a trip to the gravel and then the air fence after masterfully saving a front end lock up on corner entry. Nobody, even in the early and compartively good conditions was able to get within 1.5 secs of Stoner.

After 20 minutes of the session, Rossi went to second place, still 1.18 seconds off Stoner’s pole. A this point, de Puniet claims the top Michelin placing with 6th place, before a couple of corners later putting the LCR Honda into the gravel for the third time this weekend.

Toseland had a trip down the tarmac after losing the front at Turn 1, while running 16th and outside the 107% qualifying threshold. At this point he is ahead of just one racer - Jorge Lorenzo, and this is where both of them uncharacteristically finish up.

The third place on the front row was taken by Hopkins with a 2:12.9, closely followed by Vermeulen and de Angelis. Recent struggler West also showed improvement in form and a glimpse of his true ability, all too often hidden by set-up issues with his Kawasaki with an 6th place and a 2:14.0 right at the end of the session. Nakano with his new bike could only manage 8th, just behind top Michelin runner, and crasher, de Puniet.

Marco Melandri appeared to have some sort of an epiphany in the final 10 minutes of qualifying. He put the Ducati on 10th with a 2:15.8 - his best qualifying this season. He looked by far his most confident and at one with the Ducati this season, and was visibly faster than the other riders out with him. Perhaps this is a turning point for Marco?

With dry weather forecast for the race tomorrow, there was little to be gleaned from the times in this session. Perhaps West and Melandri can covert these good grid positions into points, but for sure we can expect Rossi to try to repeat his Laguna performance and get in front of Stoner from lights out. At the very least he will look to follow Stoner over the line and minimise the damage - this may be all he can do tomorrow, as Casey’s form looks ominously good once more.

Friday free practice 2 was a tale of the haves and the have-nots. Bridgestones were the tyre to have, no question. At one point, the top half of the timing sheet was composed entirely of Bridgestone-shod bikes, such was the gulf in performance.

The battle at the front was very much between Stoner and Rossi, the only riders to make it into the 1:57’s. At first they traded fastest times, before Stoner established a margin of half a second. Rossi was consistently fastest in sector 1 and 4, Stoner faster, much faster, in 2 and 3.

In the final runs Stoner took a further 0.1 secs off his time to widen the gap to Rossi, before running off the track on an even faster lap, with a further 1/10th off his time. Rossi’s fastest final run was again fastest in sector 1, lost 0.18 to Stoner in sector 2, but held this gap to the end of the lap. These two are steets ahead of the rest of the field, with only Capirossi, who has an affinity with this place, coming anywhere near challenging them.

Decent showings from Vermeulen, Hopkins, and Edwards were rather eclipsed by Nakano, on his new factory spec bike and de Angelis, on his satellite-spec bike. According to Eurosport commentary, Nakano’s new ride is not a pneumatic valved bike, but a spring valve of the same spec as Pedrosa has ridden all season. What a difference decent machinery makes to the performance of Nakano - and how the devil is deAngelis staying with him around here?

Dani Pedrosa never look comfortable on the bike or in the pits, sat with ice permanently strapped to his injured hand when not riding. It may be unwise for him to ride this weekend, but with a gap of 40-odd points to the lead of the championship only growing, he is obviously desperate to minimise the damage done to his challenge. The problem is, he may be prolonging the injury to his hand by doing so. It’s not too late for Dani to decide not to race this weekend, and focus on Misano. This would be a PR disaster for Repsol Honda though: no bikes on the track. Carlos Checa might be drafted in to fill the void, as was rumoured to have been discussed between Carlos and HRC following Nicky’s injury this week.

Propping up the order as per usual were Any West, struggling to get the bike to work and Marco Melandri, ditto. Both riders have the air of the condemned man about them.

It’s looking like another Rossi/Stoner battle with the rest trailing in their wake. Competition for the final podium spot will be between Capirex, Vermeulen and one of the satellite Hondas on Bridgestones.

The calendar is now up to date through to the end of the season, with just the schedules for the last two races to be finalised and published. Subscribe to the calendar by hitting the big button on the front page of the blog. You’ll need to subscribe to Google Calendar via your Google account to see it.

Michelin and Bridgestone have their work cut out this weekend. Michelin will be desperate to avoid the fiasco that they created in Laguna, by not having enough of a spread of tyre options for the condition and having to send out motorcycles, including the Repsol Hondas, on intermediates on a dry track. With the mist rolling in from the ocean, conditions were just too cold for the slick tyres the French company had on site, so inters were the only option.

The relative unknown of a new surface faces them in Brno. Resurfaced, or more accurately re-laid for this race, sees the surface considerably more smooth than previously. The old tarmac was cracking and rippling and resulted in a bumpy, uneven interface with the tyre and suspension, limiting lap times. According to Bridgestone, the problem is not now that the cracks and bumps are limiting traction, but the physical friction the tyres are able to generate with the new, smooth surface.

Both companies have been testing here with their test riders, and so the surface is far from new to them. However, Michelin are planning to being a wider-than-normal range of compounds to the track to attempt to ensure they hit on something close to that which the conditions demand.

Aside from the tarmac worries, there are rumours of an engine update for Fiat Yamaha, focused on giving Rossi the power to compete with Ducati on the straights without compromising the legendary Yamaha agility. Straights here are short and don’t allow the Ducati to maximise it’s power advantage, and the ability to exploit traction out of corners will be key. The first few metres of throttle opening and traction out of a corner can be race-deciding, as we saw in Laguna.

Other updates will see Nakano on a full pneumatic-valve factory spec. Honda, the aim being to start to nail down the satellite bike for the 2009 season. Whether we’ll see some improvement in the performance of Nakano as a result is not clear. Kawasaki have been working hard on providing more rear traction for Hopkins and West, but noises from the factory suggest the real improvement will come when the 2009 bike arrives in the hands of the team in January.

Rider rumours will also be a feature of the weekend. With the future of JiR Scott unsure and the future of Hayden, West, Vermeulen, Dovizioso, Elias, Melandri and Guintoli unclear, we would not expect anything else. The three week holiday has been remarkably gossip-free. That is about to change.