MotoGP 2012

[Crasherfromwayback]

I'm sure when you were mu age the old coggers moaned about the good old days too.

lol. Nothing's changed there mate!

[Bender]

Dani has always been a wee bit inconsistent hasnt he,some races he just blows everyone away,others he has incidents,hurts himself etc.Would like to see hi get a champoinship.As far as the championship goes When casey comes back it might make things MORE difficult for Dani.

Pedrosa was well on track last year until taken out by Simoncelli at LeMans,getting a smashed collarbone that effectively ended his championship. He'd just recovered from a broken left collarbone. I find it hard to warm to the man - he's a bit robotic, so I find it hard to get excited about his good form (feel the same way about Lorenzo). That said, I think he's certainly good enough to win the title.

[tail_end_charlie]

Mutterings now of him taking the vacant seat at Pramac...


What the....?

Yeah, I saw that too. Shit, right now I wouldn't wish a GP Duc on any rider, much less one I actually like. You have to think though, Ducati in MotoGP has gone downhill since CS won in 2007, at some point they have to reach rock bottom and start to bounce back. Right??? Either that or fold out of MotoGP..........which wouldn't really help anyone.

But then again there is so much scuttlebutt running around during the silly season that I think people make up shit just to see how far it will go. Nigh on impossible to lay down a decent prediction of where Ben is going to go.

[GD66]

I reckon. Dickhead Spanish journos cobbling up any old cow droppings to avoid being added to the 25% Spanish unemployment total...

[Crasherfromwayback]

You have to think though, Ducati in MotoGP has gone downhill since CS won in 2007, at some point they have to reach rock bottom and start to bounce back. Right???

If one of the greatest ever GP racers of all time can't win or do anything with it...I think they're already there.

[tail_end_charlie]

I reckon. Dickhead Spanish journos cobbling up any old cow droppings to avoid being added to the 25% Spanish unemployment total...

Ain't that the truth.

If one of the greatest ever GP racers of all time can't win do anything with it...I think they're already there.

So where is the bounce back? There has only been a few glimmers of hope from Rossi and Nicky this season (two if you take out the wet performances). The pendulum has to swing back in their favor at some point. Could it be next season? From what I've read/watched my understanding is that Ducati have a tendancy to make huge leaps every few years and come up with some unique design concepts, but then sorta sit with them and not do much development of it before taking another leap. Where-as the Japanese firms take a more calculated, plotted, engineered approach and make multiple developments of the bike, each progressing on what was learned from previous versions. (Not that I'm making any sweeping generalizations here or anything.)

Ducati has sorta left their normal mentality (by going for a aluminum beam frame and following the Japs) of going outside the status quo. So now they are either faced with trying to catch up with ~30 odd years of Jap expierence with this frame type, or making another one of their big leaps and come up with something radical.

[Crasherfromwayback]

So where is the bounce back? There has only been a few glimmers of hope from Rossi and Nicky this season (two if you take out the wet performances). .

Ain't been one so far. Only a very slight boing.

[merv]

As for Dani, maybe he doesn't sound so dry when he speaks in Spanish. I can imagine it aint easy fronting up to a press conference in a foreign tongue - I'd be buggered trying to do one in his language if ever I'd been famous.

[BMWST?]

Lots of chatter this morning that Ben Spies has signed with Pramac Ducati (or whatever it will be next year) and will be announced at Misano. The deal reportedly guarantees Spies a "100% Factory" bike, whatever that is.


Spies will reportedly be joined by "Crazy Joe" Ianonne.


Oh, Ben, Ben, Ben... :headshake

seems there is some substance to the spies/pramac thig

[tigertim20]

Ain't that the truth.



So where is the bounce back? There has only been a few glimmers of hope from Rossi and Nicky this season (two if you take out the wet performances). The pendulum has to swing back in their favor at some point. Could it be next season? From what I've read/watched my understanding is that Ducati have a tendancy to make huge leaps every few years and come up with some unique design concepts, but then sorta sit with them and not do much development of it before taking another leap. Where-as the Japanese firms take a more calculated, plotted, engineered approach and make multiple developments of the bike, each progressing on what was learned from previous versions. (Not that I'm making any sweeping generalizations here or anything.)

Ducati has sorta left their normal mentality (by going for a aluminum beam frame and following the Japs) of going outside the status quo. So now they are either faced with trying to catch up with ~30 odd years of Jap expierence with this frame type, or making another one of their big leaps and come up with something radical.

yes, but now they are Audi owned, so expect a shakeup in the way things are done. my suspicion would be that towards the end of next season, they will have a bike capable of harassing some of the front runners, and maybe a podium by halfway through the season after that. Audi I imagine will take a careful approach to fixing the bike

[BMWST?]

yes, but now they are Audi owned, so expect a shakeup in the way things are done. my suspicion would be that towards the end of next season, they will have a bike capable of harassing some of the front runners, and maybe a podium by halfway through the season after that. Audi I imagine will take a careful approach to fixing the bike

not sure about that.even with a good bike i am not sure that Hayden or Dovi will be fast enough to beat two factory Hondas and two factory Yamahas not to mention Bradl,Bautista et al...

[GD66]

seems there is some substance to the spies/pramac thing

If that is the case it makes his whimpering about the politics of the paddock, the lack of fun and enjoyment etc to be also a pile of cow droppings....Personally I'd like to think after what he showed in the US against the iron-willed Mladin and in his impressive WSBK attack that he really can get it together and ride at or near the front, even on one of those things . If he has another shocker, then no doubt the bell will finally toll...

[slowpoke]

Ain't that the truth.



So where is the bounce back? There has only been a few glimmers of hope from Rossi and Nicky this season (two if you take out the wet performances). The pendulum has to swing back in their favor at some point. Could it be next season? From what I've read/watched my understanding is that Ducati have a tendancy to make huge leaps every few years and come up with some unique design concepts, but then sorta sit with them and not do much development of it before taking another leap. Where-as the Japanese firms take a more calculated, plotted, engineered approach and make multiple developments of the bike, each progressing on what was learned from previous versions. (Not that I'm making any sweeping generalizations here or anything.)

Ducati has sorta left their normal mentality (by going for a aluminum beam frame and following the Japs) of going outside the status quo. So now they are either faced with trying to catch up with ~30 odd years of Jap expierence with this frame type, or making another one of their big leaps and come up with something radical.

Go back and check out the article Pritch linked a few days back, it explains a lot. Preziosi/Ducati are being very calculated, analysing and verifying rather than making wholesale changes. I had lost faith in Preziosi but after reading that I'm giving the guy a bit more leeway.

[DidJit]

Next year’s grid is beginning to fill up...

[tail_end_charlie]

Go back and check out the article Pritch linked a few days back, it explains a lot. Preziosi/Ducati are being very calculated, analysing and verifying rather than making wholesale changes. I had lost faith in Preziosi but after reading that I'm giving the guy a bit more leeway.

Your're talking about the Italian magazine article right? This one:
http://manziana.motocorse.com/blog/32890_Desmo-whys

Read that one, and it was quite interesting. Maybe what I was trying to say wasn't coming out too clear though. Ducati, being a small manufacturer (compared to Honda and Yamaha, and Suzuki & Kawasaki for that matter) don't have the money or resources for continuos R&D to the extent that the Japanese manufuactures do. Ducati can't go round for round with the Japs trying to match immediately every improvement that they make. I'm not trying to say they (Preziosi/Ducati) is stupid for not doing that, not at all. They are just operating on a different timeline to the others. The head of HRC, Nakamoto, is working on the belief that it takes three years of development to get a championship winning bike (Preziosi said 2 years). And that is working on the continuous development of said bike. In the last 3 or 4 years Ducati has jumped from a cromoly tube frame, to a CF/stressed engine frame, to a AL/stressed engine frame, to a AL beam frame, and also throwing in a change from 800 to 1000cc. There is not a whole lot of consistancy there with the overall layout. So lots of big leaps recently w/o enough time to sort out the changes needed to go from design concept to working/winning prototype.

Now I don't know about you, but to me those changes would constitute a wholesale change.

Now some of this theory may be skewed by the generalizations that I have about cultures. From my time in uni studing engineering I found that a lot of the asian (mostly Tiwanese and some Japs and Koreans) were very good at crunching numbers and working along in a linear fashion. I'm not real familar with their culture, but I think that this sortof aligns with that. They were, perhaps, not quite as eager as Europeans/Americans to think outside the box, and jump for radical changes. This however is my personal theory and I'm sure it will get some shit slung at me about generalising.