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Thread: Now there will be six

  1. #1
    Senior Member Moderator Gramps's Avatar
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    Re: Now there will be six

    Maybe they should focus on getting their factory squad moving in the right direction vs more spots on the grid...

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    Re: Now there will be six

    With Gigi Dall'igna at the helm, we may see some good things from Ducati over the next couple years. This season hasn't been too bad for them either, with the exception being that they needed concessions -more fuel, and the soft rear tire option- to make it happen. But, I really don't think Avintia has anything to lose by making the switch. Unless Kawasaki fields a full MotoGP team, they'd be out of luck come 2016.

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    Re: Now there will be six

    Quote Originally Posted by rush4theyeho View Post
    Maybe they should focus on getting their factory squad moving in the right direction vs more spots on the grid...
    This will only help with that, 3 teams and 6 bikes is 50% more data from every race.
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    Gold Member madvlad's Avatar
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    Re: Now there will be six

    Quote Originally Posted by Drano View Post
    With Gigi Dall'igna at the helm, we may see some good things from Ducati over the next couple years. This season hasn't been too bad for them either, with the exception being that they needed concessions -more fuel, and the soft rear tire option- to make it happen. But, I really don't think Avintia has anything to lose by making the switch. Unless Kawasaki fields a full MotoGP team, they'd be out of luck come 2016.
    Ducati is the only factory team allowed to run the open bike options and they still suck even with Dovizioso finishing good in some races.
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    Re: Now there will be six

    Quote Originally Posted by madvlad View Post
    Ducati is the only factory team allowed to run the open bike options and they still suck even with Dovizioso finishing good in some races.
    Is it me, or do you just hate all things Ducati? Not that it's wrong if you do, it would just explain the antagonism. We all have our own tastes when it comes to motorcycling.

    Anyway, you say that Ducati sucks, and I get that, to an extent, but that doesn't dampen my optimism that Gigi Dall'igna can shake things up and make the necessary changes to bring them up to the same standards as the rest of the field. Besides, I like cheering for the underdog. Hell, as much as I enjoy watching Marquez win every race and rewrite the history books I'd still like to see him get beaten. And I did mention that Ducati's results this season come due to concessions. I'm not wearing rose-tinted glasses here, I accept the reailty for what it is. It's not wrong to hope that it gets better for Ducati. Should I hope that it gets worse for them? Does anybody really want the field to become entirely comprised of Yamahas and Hondas?

    From my perspective, riders like Dovizioso, Crutchlow, and Ianonne deserve to have their rides match their level of skill and I think it's pretty stupid that any factory/satellite team should need open-class concessions to be competitive. Could you imagine the snickering by other factory riders any time you take a decent result because your bike needed an exception to be there? That would be one of the most demoralizing and disheartening things for any rider wishing to prove that he can stand proud on the podium because of his ability to do so. Ducati needs to step up their game, and I think it's going to happen sooner rather than later under Gigi. Nuff said.
    Last edited by Drano; Thu Jul 24th, 2014 at 08:50 PM.

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    Senior Member The Black Knight's Avatar
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    Re: Now there will be six

    Quote Originally Posted by Drano View Post
    Is it me, or do you just hate all things Ducati? Not that it's wrong if you do, it would just explain the antagonism. We all have our own tastes when it comes to motorcycling.

    Anyway, you say that Ducati sucks, and I get that, to an extent, but that doesn't dampen my optimism that Gigi Dall'igna can shake things up and make the necessary changes to bring them up to the same standards as the rest of the field. Besides, I like cheering for the underdog. Hell, as much as I enjoy watching Marquez win every race and rewrite the history books I'd still like to see him get beaten. And I did mention that Ducati's results this season come due to concessions. I'm not wearing rose-tinted glasses here, I accept the reailty for what it is. It's not wrong to hope that it gets better for Ducati. Should I hope that it gets worse for them? Does anybody really want the field to become entirely comprised of Yamahas and Hondas?

    From my perspective, riders like Dovizioso, Crutchlow, and Ianonne deserve to have their rides match their level of skill and I think it's pretty stupid that any factory/satellite team should need open-class concessions to be competitive. Could you imagine the snickering by other factory riders any time you take a decent result because your bike needed an exception to be there? That would be one of the most demoralizing and disheartening things for any rider wishing to prove that he can stand proud on the podium because of his ability to do so. Ducati needs to step up their game, and I think it's going to happen sooner rather than later under Gigi. Nuff said.
    The thing is Ducati have had more than enough time to develop a competitive bike. I, know we've gone over this time and time again. It's my personal belief that they haven't had a real competitive bike since around 2008/09 seasons. Stoner's 2010 year was o.k. but only three races were won on the Ducati. Where is Ducati's innovation that brought them the title in 2007?? We all know the GP7 was head and shoulders above everyone else. Just as the current iteration of the RC213V is doing now.

    Granted Ducati had a rider(Stoner) that was willing to push the limits of the ability of the bike(especially after 2007). Rossi wasn't willing to take on the "win it or bin it" mindset, primarily just coming off a year with a broken leg(2010).

    I, think Ducati need to find the right rider again in order to find the limits of their POS machine. Rossi, Dovi, Hayden and Crutchlow are all world class riders but none of them are/were willing to ride the bike in the way Stoner did. I, think Iannone is probably the closest of them all in doing this, as seen by some of his crashes he's experienced. Now does all this mean that Stoner was a superior rider than all these other riders?? Yes and No. Yes, in that he was willing to ride around the bikes fallacies and that he is better than two of the riders listed that are on Factory machines(Dovi and Crutchlow). No, in that even when the Ducati started to suffer in terms of development he wasn't able to ride around the bikes problems(and no he's not superior to Rossi or Hayden, as both are World Champions same as Stoner and whether you've got one or seven World titles they(the riders) are all in a class of their own).

    I, think MadVlad shares the same disdain for Ducati that I do.

    You certainly said what I was thinking as well. In my opinion, any rider on an Open Class Ducati that manages a podium should experience a somewhat diminished fulfillment of being on the podium. I, look at it as a podium earned via a concession and "not" level playing field. In my opinion, Rossi's and Hayden's podiums on the Ducati are of greater importance because they were earned the right way, without these bogus "Open Class" rules in place. Their podiums got earned the hard way battling with all the other riders on equal playing field "rule wise".

    I, am in agreement with you in that it will be a matter of when, not if Ducati start producing better results. They should, with 6 riders now in the field, they have six guys doing development work for them in real time, on the race track, during the race. Problem is, Ducati need to be running in the regular "Factory" class. If they really wanted to develop their bike, they would put more time into it during the off season and produce a competitive bike. I, think running under the guise of "Open Class" rules to develop their bike is a bit cheesy and the easy way out. Sure Gigi saw an opportunity and seized it. It's only good business for him to take advantage of the situation. Problem is, it's the easy way out.

    Keep in mind, this whole "dumbass" engine development freeze wouldn't be in place had the other manufactures "not named Honda" stuck to their guns and not allowed it to become implemented. Instead Yamaha(the biggest player in this fiasco) kindly spread their cheeks and let Honda give them the business.

    Honestly, I'm with Rossi on this. I can't wait until 2016 to see all this BS go away and get back to a more roots based MotoGP racing format. Rules should be the same across the board and hopefully it will be as he said, "year zero" and everything will go back to square one. How much will it go back to the way it was, time will tell. The reason engineers and developers exist is to get around the rules. So bikes will be developed to take advantage of whatever advantage there is to take. But with a standard ECU, less electronics it may force things to swing back into the "riders" favor. We may be going back to the old adage of "80% rider, 20% bike".
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    Re: Now there will be six

    Exactly, I think if Ducati can't run without the open class rules, they need to step it up. Look at Harley & Buell in NHRA drag racing. They are allowed how much more cubic inch motors than Suzuki!!! To me it's bullshit. I understand the 2cyl. Vtwin, can't rev like the Japanese bikes but come on let's be fair. Seems to me when Harley stepped into NHRA they were always allowed advancement S when they would lose races.

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    Gold Member madvlad's Avatar
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    Re: Now there will be six

    I don't hate them at all, just as mentioned they've had way too much time to develop a bike and really haven't made any noticeable progress... Dovi seems more comfortable on his ride and well Cal is new so cant talk bad at all there as it takes time to adjust but IMHO I don't think that bike fits his style... maybe under Gigi things will change and with Iannone being thirsty for a Factory spot he'll push that Pramac even harder and my boy Yonny hernandez finishing better and better each time so not all is bad for them. I just can't believe that even with open factory options they can't manage anything constant. Hell satellite teams are doing better than they are being a factory team... All in all I am a noob obviously and don't know exactly what they focus on or what their plans are but when you dump that much money into an approach/plan/bike that simply isn't working but you keep stabbing at it with the same strategy and no change in years, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to realize it just isn't working.
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    Re: Now there will be six

    No worries, guys, I'm with you about the obscene amount of time Ducati has had to develop a competitive platform. But Gigi has only been with them for part of a season. I'm willing to give him some time because I think putting him in charge spells good things. He's not just there to practice business as usual. He's not content to keep things the way they are, and has said as much:
    http://www.cycleworld.com/2013/11/12...neral-manager/
    I will start with organization. There are two completely different units inside Ducati Corse. One is the racetrack unit, and the other is the people who live in Bologna. The first job will be to properly join these two areas to improve the flow of information from the racetrack to the people who work at Ducati. After that, I have to work on the technical problems.
    Granted, his decision to run open-class is questionable, but I can understand Dall'igna's logic for taking advantage of it. I'm not saying I agree with it, but it makes sense from a development perspective to seize every opportunity to improve the bike even if it means playing at a higher handicap for a season.
    http://www.bennetts.co.uk/bikesocial.../#.U9IZ3bGB_2o
    The results and the data that we gained during the last two tests in Sepang and Phillip Island have given us the opportunity to choose between two different options, and in the end we chose the Open option for MotoGP. This is really important because we need to improve the bike, and to do this we need to change some things on the bike. For sure with the Factory option it’s not possible to change a lot of things, the engine in particular, instead with Open we have the possibility to use 12 engines instead of 5, the possibility to develop the engine, the possibility to test in different tracks, so the restrictions of the tests are less with the Open than with the Factory solution. ...The Ducati decision (to go ‘Open’) makes someone not so happy, but this is not our intention. We would like to develop the bike and with the Factory option we simply could not do it. For us the situation is clear, and the option is clear. For sure this will be the future of MotoGP because we have to reduce the costs and this solution can help. We have to live in the real world and the real world is not the ideal world, and sometimes you have to accept compromises. I understand the organizers, because the small teams cannot work like a factory or factory supported teams so Dorna would like to reduce these options, but we will see.
    Perhaps these are things you guys have seen and heard from Ducati before. I'm really new to the sport, but I'm hopeful that they are finally taking steps in the right direction by recognizing their flaws, and fixing them.
    http://www.motogp.com/en/news/2014/C...i+Team+in+2015
    We have made some progress but not enough and we need to work even harder in the second half of the season. We have a new fairing coming soon and we’ll have a new chassis at Aragon. Our goal, which will be difficult to achieve before the end of the year but not impossible, is to reduce the gap to the front to 10 seconds.
    As the old adage says, "Only time will tell." I'm waiting for, and expecting, positive results.
    Last edited by Drano; Fri Jul 25th, 2014 at 03:41 AM.

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