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dampflok
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Before Assen, Stoner had fallen behind Lorenzo by quite a few points, then Lorenzo DNF'd at Assen, letting Stoner draw even. Now, at Sachsenring, Stoner crashed out of second place on the last lap(!). Lorenzo took second, and Stoner is once again in a big hole. Argh!
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fa2al
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Talk about an exciting race. I literally screamed, "Noooooooooooo!" at my tv when Stoner went down. There were some excellent battles. Pedrosa vs Stoner. Dovizioso vs Spies. Bradl vs Rossi vs Bautista vs Crutchlow vs Barbera vs Hayden. Got to give it up to Bradl for not cracking under pressure.
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danielgr
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dampflok wrote:
Before Assen, Stoner had fallen behind Lorenzo by quite a few points, then Lorenzo DNF'd at Assen, letting Stoner draw even. Now, at Sachsenring, Stoner crashed out of second place on the last lap(!). Lorenzo took second, and Stoner is once again in a big hole. Argh!
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Argh! indeed...
That said, trying to be positive it was maybe the first time of the year the Honda's shown some clear advantage pace wise. For sure Lorenzo wasn't still 100% after the Bautista drama, but still, Stoner himself seems to feel confident as well.
Either way, I rather have both riders pushing for the win until the last lap with one falling than cruising to the flag to ensure their respective championship points. That was nice racing, though I must admit I was expecting Dani to be the one cracking all race long. Now let's hope Stoner can come back to put a fight the rest of the season. If we keep having 1-2 finishes yesterday mistake will not be important. If not... that's racing !
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sadlerau
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Agreed Daniel, I too was expecting Pedrosa to be the one to crack. It is very important that Pedrosa takes the next step and become a consistent race winner, especially when dicing for the lead. Lord knows, Honda will need this form with the absence of Stoner next year.
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chazcra
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stoner shouldn't ave push that hard period he had a go at dani earlier in that lap or i think lap before and had a moment which means he weren't going to beat dani so what do you do take second place and champ lead make sense plus most important team points job done. On the subject of dani's performance he has raised his pace over the four or so race and would ave won last race if wasn't for the new bridgestone tires. I think honda has the bike again so next track should show just how much progress they've made because its not as small so no artificial bunching up can't wait
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CafeDelMar90
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stoner shouldn't ave push that hard period
well if your not a racer then you wouldnt understand what Casey did. If you have raced a bike, and were as close to Dani then you can definitely sympathise with the error. I say unlucky Casey, a true racer if ever there was one. Being greedy about the championship is not what he does, as he stated before "win races and the championsihp will sort itself out" so well done to Casey for sticking with it.
On the other hand I was very very surprised with the pace of the Repsols!! 15 seconds ahead of Jorge!! sure lorenzo has a bung leg but in any case thats a huge gap..even the usually speedy satellite Tech3s were miles behind...and Sachsenring is a tight and twisty track more suited to the sweet handling Yamahas. Jorge was complaining after the race that he just couldnt get the hard tire to work unlike the Repsols, as he wanted to use the softs...but Bridgestone advised him to use the hards as the soft tire might disentegrate later in the race...wtf!!!
Have Honda finally found something? I spotted Tetsuo Suzuki (HRC president) at the race! Did they roll out a new chassis? Casey wasnt complaining about chatter post race (first time!) in fact post race he seemed supremely confident, as if he knows the bike is getting better for him. Dani was looking over the moon too. Fingers crossed! hope its true that the Repsols are coming good...and heres a quote from Valentino Rossi about it:
"Unfortunately the distance to the Hondas is huge because in the last two races the Hondas did a great step.” Bring on Mugello!!
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ldvknight
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Great race, but another disappointing one for American Ben Spies. Doing so well in has debut season with the Tech 3 bike. Now he's qualifying better but still slowly falls back in the race. Such a shame, not sure if he'll have a factory ride next year. Heck, maybe Honda should pick up Spies. Perhaps the Honda would better suit him.
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danielgr
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ldvknight wrote:
Great race, but another disappointing one for American Ben Spies. Doing so well in has debut season with the Tech 3 bike. Now he's qualifying better but still slowly falls back in the race. Such a shame, not sure if he'll have a factory ride next year. Heck, maybe Honda should pick up Spies. Perhaps the Honda would better suit him.
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I can't remember now how many times people have hoped for somebody to prove that statement wrong, but that still hasn't happened, and Spies is not going to change it.
As for Honda, they'll do what they've always done, pic up one of the leading riders from the lower classes, which will be Marc Marquez. Again, being Spanish (like me) the "nationalistic critic" is too easy, but I sure hope you can read beyond the flag and understand what I'm saying. Personally I don't like Spies much (nor dislike him, in fact, I'm pretty neutral about him), but I've always had great respect for both Colin and Nicky for example. My respect though doesn't win world champions, and constantly failing to outpace the satellite guys it is indeed very likely that Spies will lose his factory ride next year.
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dampflok
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danielgr wrote:
[F]or those that have spent decades watching this sport, it is pretty much clear than the superbike guys aren't up to the top MotoGP level. It simply goes like that, mid-high field MotoGP riders are Superbike title contenders, Superbike champions mid-high field MotoGP riders...
I can't remember now how many times people have hoped for somebody to prove that statement wrong, but that still hasn't happened . . . . |
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P54
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CafeDelMar90 wrote:
Did they roll out a new chassis?
YES
http://world.honda.com/MotoGPreport/2012/round7/index.html
You introduced a chassis with different specs this time. Dani was using the new bike – what kind of feedback did you get from him?
Dani tried out both the old and the new spec chassis and decided he liked the new better, so he rode that bike for the second and third days. We started using the new spec front tires at Silverstone. These are a bit less rigid than the old ones and weren't such a good match for our previous chassis. This made braking rather soft and mushy, which is something Dani hates and it gave him a lot of trouble at Silverstone. We changed the specs on the new chassis to match this new tire and it has really improved the feeling on the front. However, there aren't many hard braking points here at Assen, so we can't tell for certain yet whether we've completely solved this one. During Dani's attack in qualifying, the soft feeling did appear, and this made it hard for him when the bike began twisting after the tires had worn in during the later part of the race. That's why Dani ran out of stamina and Casey was able to leave him behind at the end.
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ldvknight
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danielgr wrote:
As for Honda, they'll do what they've always done, pic up one of the leading riders from the lower classes, which will be Marc Marquez. Again, being Spanish (like me) the "nationalistic critic" is too easy, but I sure hope you can read beyond the flag and understand what I'm saying. Personally I don't like Spies much (nor dislike him, in fact, I'm pretty neutral about him), but I've always had great respect for both Colin and Nicky for example. My respect though doesn't win world champions, and constantly failing to outpace the satellite guys it is indeed very likely that Spies will lose his factory ride next year.
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I haven't followed this sport very long, but i just don't buy that. What's really the difference between Moto2 for example versus World Superbike? The politics? The amount of money? I mean Spies was the 2010 MotoGP Rookie of the Year.
There are the Greats like Stoner and Alonso who simply make the results happen regardless of which bikes/car they are on, but I feel Spies my be in the same fold as Roman Grosjean.
A switch may work. Granted that's quite a bit of risk for Honda to take and this is his second season with Yamaha and the results should be showing by now, but the US is such a big market for Honda.
What happened to Gresini Honda (Marco's Factory backed bike)? That may have been a good place to try him out.
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danielgr
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ldvknight wrote:
danielgr wrote:
As for Honda, they'll do what they've always done, pic up one of the leading riders from the lower classes, which will be Marc Marquez. Again, being Spanish (like me) the "nationalistic critic" is too easy, but I sure hope you can read beyond the flag and understand what I'm saying. Personally I don't like Spies much (nor dislike him, in fact, I'm pretty neutral about him), but I've always had great respect for both Colin and Nicky for example. My respect though doesn't win world champions, and constantly failing to outpace the satellite guys it is indeed very likely that Spies will lose his factory ride next year.
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I haven't followed this sport very long, but i just don't buy that. What's really the difference between Moto2 for example versus World Superbike? The politics? The amount of money? I mean Spies was the 2010 MotoGP Rookie of the Year.
There are the Greats like Stoner and Alonso who simply make the results happen regardless of which bikes/car they are on, but I feel Spies my be in the same fold as Roman Grosjean.
A switch may work. Granted that's quite a bit of risk for Honda to take and this is his second season with Yamaha and the results should be showing by now, but the US is such a big market for Honda.
What happened to Gresini Honda (Marco's Factory backed bike)? That may have been a good place to try him out.
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1) The tracks, because GP riders are born on those tracks and they spend their lives in there.
2) The prototype bikes; because GP riders are born with them, learning to set them up, tweak them, give feedback on them, how they respond to setup changes, etc. whereas the superbikes are much more limited in that respect.
3) The competition, because I believe the best young riders go straight to GP and not into Superbikes, though that obviously depends on nationality, but still think "overall truth".
As for Ben, he has been given a factory ride for two years and failed to make an impression. On the same time Lorenzo kept the fight with a 9 times world champion and won...
There are not many better bikes he could get, and he is being trashed by his teammate and beaten by others on inferior machinery, that is where any rider's hope for a factory bike end.
Actually, the two guys that keep pushing him from the satellite team are those most likely to grab a factory ride for next year... but the silly season is still going on... we will see what happens.
PS1: Being rookie of the year doesn't mean you'll be worldchampion, because there are many rookies every year, and only a handfull of champions / consistent race winners. If the question is will Dovizioso become world champion if given the proper ride? The answer is I don't think so, he was the best of his generation, but still short of the guys on top.
PS2: Just in case, never said that superbike riders aren't good, just that the best of the best are forged somewhere else.
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sadlerau
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ldvknight wrote:
I haven't followed this sport very long, but i just don't buy that. What's really the difference between Moto2 for example versus World Superbike? The politics? The amount of money? I mean Spies was the 2010 MotoGP Rookie of the Year.
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The difference between a Superbike and Moto2 bike? Something like a Nascar and an openwheeler. Both difficult to drive, but different. MotoGP more so.
While Hayden is one who has won the world championship [and I really do love the guy's character] he is not on the top rung of riders [of which there are only really two at the moment].
Troy Bayliss is a good example - unbeatable on a Superbike, but just a good, second rung rider in MotoGP. Able to win in the right circumstances, but not week in, week out!
Honda's only hope at the moment is that Pedrosa steps up. But having said that, Spies on a satellite Honda would make good sense as well, as I feel he has lost his way on the Yamaha in the past 12 months. A change to Honda just may work for him?
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danielgr
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dampflok wrote:
danielgr wrote:
[F]or those that have spent decades watching this sport, it is pretty much clear than the superbike guys aren't up to the top MotoGP level. It simply goes like that, mid-high field MotoGP riders are Superbike title contenders, Superbike champions mid-high field MotoGP riders...
I can't remember now how many times people have hoped for somebody to prove that statement wrong, but that still hasn't happened . . . . |
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That is actually one of the reasons I have so much respect for Nicky. He proved that keeping your head down and working your ass out of it you can win if given a chance (having a vastly superior bike and the only major rival crashing several times), despite not being the most talented, and despite your young ambitious teammate stupidity.
Yet Nick wasn't the fastest that year, and has never been. He was just there when he needed to be and run with it. Nicky is, as I said, a mid-high field MotoGP rider.
Right now though, you have 3+1 (asuming Rossi still has it if he rides something else) very strong riders, so the "power hole" of which Nicky benefitted is not going to happen anytime soon. Sure we will be losing 1 next year (Stoner), but the key number to make it happen is 1, and then again, Marquez may turn up to be another future world champion. We'll see...
And btw, the position in which he (Nicky) finds himself now is rather unconfortable (needing to wait for Rossi and Carl decissions to know if he has a place at Ducati...). Maybe it's time for him to return to SuperBike and start wining again. That'd be nice, but I've got the feeling he still wants to be in MotoGP for a while...
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