Can Bayliss ride the GP9?

http://www.motogp.com/en/news/2009/Troy+Bayliss+will+be+in+Monza+on+board+the+GP9+next+week



--
Andrew
00 Daytona
00 Speed Triple
71 Kawi H1
05 Squiddo

 

I see no reason why Bayliss shouldn't be able to ride it at least as
well as Sete Gibernau. And probably quite a bit faster than Canepa or
Guarescchi.

I'm still puzzled by how testing works with the spec tyres. You can buy
Bridgestone track day slicks, but can Ducati (and all the rest) buy
Bridgestone MotoGP slicks so their testing riders can ride all day every
day?

 

Maybe they are lining him up to replace a piss poor [as i shouted he
would be] Yank?

 

I don't think there's any chance at all of Bayliss racing. Word is his
wife has vetoed it.

 

Champ

No question he had a very good first year, I think really all the new
SB guys did that year (especially relative to the one 250 guy,
Melandri). But how many times did he crash out of races n '04 when the
chassis went south, like five? My take is at the heart of things we're
talking about another chassis issue here, and will he be any more
successful in diagnosing this one?

Again, it's not a rider problem, it's a machine problem. So who they
should be looking for are some good engineers and chassis ideas. If
they are depending on rider input to solve the problem at this point,
they are in an almost hopeless situation.

Yeah, he's usually a very circumspect guy and a team player. What it
says to me is he feels he's not getting the support he needs. That may
be that he thinks the chassis needs real changes and they're not
forthcoming, or he doesn't have the programmers who can make the thing
rideable for him.

If things keep going the way they have been, I wonder when Ducati will
put the Marco Muzzle on him?

 

Except that the focus will all be on the guy challenging for the
championship. As long as Casey is winning races and getting podiums,
will anyone believe there's a problem?

I think Hayden is a thinking rider who wants to fix the machine. And it
wouldn't surprise me if he can't get the right Italians to pay the right
attention. And I wonder if there's a connection between Ducati and
people like Fogarty, Bayliss, Stoner and to an only slightly lesser
extent Capirossi who like, and liked, to dominate a machine.

I think there's something really quite strange about Stoner's riding
style. He climbs all over the machine. He's good at the 250 style late
breaking and trail braking into near the apex. Then as he comes off the
brakes he absolutely slams the machine down onto his knee and then
almost immediately wrenches it up again. Then when the bike is still
leant over quite a way he's hard on the gas with the bike bucking and
weaving. Watch him from behind and there's 3 definite stages to each
corner. Trail braking and acceleration at 35-40 degs and a short period
in the middle at 55 deg with very abrupt transitions between each stage.
This isn't classic 250 style. But it's not classic superbike style
either.

 

 It seems to me that anyone who might be able to throw

2 options i can see

1/Yes, Bayliss can ride it, and perfectly, you have the skill or not,
note how well Rossi [God] did 1st year on the "unrideable" Yamaha,

2/Give the ride to WHO SHOULD HAVE BEEN Stoners team mate all along,
the 250 king Marco Simoncelli, that guy is good, REALLY good!

I believe he will be on it next year anyway!

Nicky was alway a average rider, how he *beat* Rossi a few years ago
one can still not believe, i think USA can make good riders just Nicky
is not one of them, find of the year would have to be Spies?

Team!

 

Mark N asks:

Yep. Hayden 1.5 seconds behind Stoner in qualifying last week in
Jerez. Sykes 1.3 seconds behind Spies today at Monza. In both
cases, rider (Hayden and Sykes) and crew not getting the job done
as well as their team mate (Spies and Stoner)..

Problem is not the bike, at least not as long as somebody has
figured out how to win races and championships on it. Might
not be the best bike out there but the combo is. Saying it's the
bike's fault when Stoner's team mate can't make it work is
lame. It works - there's proof. If others can't make it work,
the problem is with them.

I'm surprised Hayden hasn't done better. I hope he and
the Italians can figure out how to make it work for him.


Go fast. Take chances.
Mike S.

 

I wasn't trying to get at the fans attitude but at the factory's
attitude. I'm sure they'd like to have a solid #2 and a solid satellite
team. But at the same time they've won a championship and come close to
winning a second. As long as Stoner keeps on running at the front, the
fact that #2 can't do the same is unfortunate but not a disaster.

I think this is inherent in Ducatis. Ride them slowly and they're
horrible. Dominate it, throw it around, abuse it and it will reward you
by asking for more. In racing, a lot of the guys who've been successful
on Ducatis have had an aggressive, all action style. But then there's
probably plenty of examples of smooth riders being successful as well.
Corser, Kocinski, Reynolds, Lavilla come to mind.

What? How is an ex-F1 designer looking for a big leap forward and a
whole new way of manufacturing street bikes an admission of problems
with the previous design?

I think the problems are all much more human than that. The Italians
have a reputation for being extremely focussed and passionate when
things are going well, and throwing expresso driven fits when they go
badly. Ducati's race shop is a small team with a small number of
talented people. They have to focus on the bike/rider that's getting
results. If the #2 is back in 15th, how is he going to get Filippo
Preziosi's attention? Then there's Hayden's development style. If he
can't do huge numbers of testing laps, and practice is cut, how's he
going to make his development style work?

In a similar vein, What happened with Yamaha at Jerez? Rossi-Burgess
made huge changes sunday night and Lorenzo didn't. Rossi won the race,
Lorenzo suffered all the problems Rossi had on Sat afternoon. These
things are fickle, not just the Ducatis and finding that last 1sec via
setup can be extremely hard.

 

I think this is inherent in Ducatis. Ride them slowly and they're

You may have a point there. I own a street Ducati and it steers more
akin to a race 125 than a 900. If you don't go into corners fast
enough it oversteers badly. I can't see Hayden lasting if all he will
do is mumble about what appears to be basic handling trim - for
example; Pedrosa never rated his potential for development. A bike
that runs off line into corners and is only OK for accelerating or
braking probably needs some suspension adjustment not Team adjustment
and if Hayden doesn't stop blaming others then Ducati will make a
rider adjustment. They have got one rider who will lead a race when
the other will be last after the second lap. Its not going to last.

 

I'm curious if you've ever ridden a 125 GP.
I seriously doubt your 900 steers anything like a 125 GP.
Feel free to prove me wrong.

--
Andrew
00 Daytona
00 Speed Triple
71 Kawi H1
05 Squiddo

 

Ducatis are not like other bikes. They've always been very happy to
think outside the box. For a few years now they've had Alan Jenkins on
board and with his F1 background they've done a load of work on aeros,
and been progressively replacing bits of the bike with CF. If anyone was
going to make the leap of faith to a monocoque chassis it was Ducati,
especially when they're already using a stressed engine as a major part
of the chassis. They were already using the CF airbox as stiffening for
the chassis, so just removing the tubes is completely logical, even if
it is daring. And the potential benefits in terms of slimmer packaging
and/or larger airbox and/or chassis stiffness control are large.

The theories about the aluminium version are that if the FIM banned CF
frames, they had a backup. And that an aluminium version would be easier
to productionise for their street bikes. It wouldn't surprise me at all
if the 2011 1198R has the same style of chassis but in Ally instead of
CF.

So the primary weakness of the GP bike is the chassis? Well maybe, along
with heat management, side wind performance, throttle aggression on part
throttle, ECU complexity, inconsistent sensitivity to adjustments,
optimisation for this year's Bridgestones as opposed to last years,
weight distribution with different sized riders and so on and on. In
fact all the stuff that makes MotoGP impossibly hard.

 

I've been around long enough to know when a rider does or doesn't set
up a bike properly. Too bad your inane comments show up your
mentality. One liners are too dismissive to represent any thought
process, I think you do not have valid answers. There is no need to
express yourself by any other way than using the Queens English.
Hayden has not shown consistency for Motogp and by now he should not
need to talk about solving probloems but how they were solved (like
his team mate). The Jerez gp was a laughable outing for No69, perhaps
he might resign rather than be dismissed. I have admiration for a
rider who will overcome the odds and resignation for one that cannot.

 

Thank you so much for your help. You did so well that we're promoting
you to a desk job.

Nothing, if not diplomatic.

Unlike Pupulin.

 

Translation: Hayden hater. And probably anti-septic as well...

 

Huh. I look at Monza qualifying and see Sykes only 0.003 off Spies
time. Oh, you mean in SuperPole, where they try to create false drama
and limit the number of Q tires, where guys get weeded out over time,
where one quick lap makes all the difference, etc. Nice legit
comparison, Mike.

So by that logic one shouldn't ever talk about Rossi having an
inferior machine with Yamaha in '04, since that bike won nine races
and the championship - the bike wasn't a problem, "as long as somebody
has figured out how to win races and championships on it"...

 

You admire a Quitter?

 

Well actually it is a comment about me being called a 'Hayden hater'.
Rather than be annoyed I would say that instead. Truth is 'like'
doesn't come into it, I don't have any emotion for racers - good or
bad. They know the risks and if they can't stand the heat then get out
of the....

 

A man's gotta know his limitations.