Not that it uncovers any major trends though, and conditions weren't optimal to boot.
Well Honda (or at least Pedrosa) has effectively a brand new bike. New frame, swingarm, engine, ohlins, fairing. Hard to draw any conclusions as it was stupidly hot and they lost half a day to rain. And of course, it's only testing. Doe the engines used in these tests (and the one day ones later in the season) count towards their 6?
How about Edwards running in 3rd and saying the M1 has a lot more grunt down low? That is interesting as hell. Vale says it is quite fast, as well. What did they do to move the power down lower and still keep the bike fast? I wonder how many races the engine will do.
There's a bunch of bets, or maybe a drinking game - Which of the factories will have an engine blow up first on a factory bike? - How many race before Suzuki elect to start from the back of the grid in order to get a fresh engine? - Which Rookie will have a huge high side first? (already won by Marco Simoncelli)
Rossi remains the best Yamaha rider. Honda riders still have problems. The Bot creeps up on a good time. The others are confused. Stoner remains far ahead of the other Ducati riders. Again, Spies impresses with the methodical way he approaches it. No huge high sides, just continuous steady progress. He's going to surprise this year with the way he can get the Ducati solidly into the mid field. (love that faint praise!) - 4 riders making a proper race of it at the front. 2 Texans and occasionally others 10 secs back. That's not so bad. That's going to be interesting. Why don't they go all the way... - 800 free prototypes - 1000cc restricted bore, valve springs only (no pneumatic, no desmo) - 1200cc twins with a weight advantage Then in a couple of years they can phase out the 800s and further tighten the 1000-1200 rules. Perhaps they could introduce a complicated rolling handicap system for the 1200-2s. And a 3 part final qualifying session. And a bizarre points system like AMA and BSB. Oh. Wait.
Bloody crashnet. Oh well. Somewhere on crash.net are a bunch of photos from the Sepang test. And some of them are of Pedrobot and Simoncelli on the Honda.
With a new engine configuration. aka Big Bang, or soft bang or something. Seems to me this year's Honda has a bigger fairing that is almost identical to the Yamaha and not that dis-similar to the Ducati. And a new frame. And new suspension. And everyone gets one. And yet Pedrosa is still significantly faster than everyone else. Edwards complained last year about lack of power when the engine lifetime limits started to bite. But now he's saying how powerful this year's engine is. It'll be interesting to see what he says 3-6 meetings into the season. If Espargaro ends up 3rd Ducati and close in times to Hayden then he will have done well. And I think he might manage that. But then who knows what Barbera will do. Run people off the track?
Err, why? Rossi 1s faster than Edwards at Sepang doesn't seem surprising in the slightest. Why should Stoner being 1s faster than Hayden be surprising? Or that Stoner genuinely is 1s faster than anyone else on a Ducati. At Sepang.
Mark N believes: To paraphrase, "Beliefs are like assholes, everybody's got one." In this case, a second difference between two riders on identical MotoGP bikes is not unusual at all. Besides rider ability, which can be a second or more easily, bike setup can be another big hunk of time. Go fast. Take chances. Mike S.
I agree setup can make that sort of difference, that is evidenced in the time progress riders make over a weekend, at least back when they actually had tire choices to consider. But I don't agree that there is evidence that two top riders on identical bikes have talent-based one- second gaps at this level, especially when you consider factors like what Champ mentions, a bike being better-suited for one rider than another. There really is no "proof" either way, of course, but what I look at is the lap differences between guys who have the best machines their factory builds and has been impacted most by their input/desires and guys who assumedly aren't as good, who aren't in that position and have to use older versions of the same stuff with no real input. The gap there can be something like a second or so or even less at the average track, and there's just too much else going on to attribute much of that to pure riding talent and intellegence. Anyway, it's just what people believe, and I happen not to believe those gaps exist at the cutting edge that is GP's premier class, these guys are (mostly) all too good and so the machines running too close to their theoretical limits. You believe otherwise. Of course, I also think anyone who subscribes to the Burgess "80% rider, 20% bike" notion is also likely to believe that the differences can be that great, they almost have to.
Suggest you go back and look at the practice sessions for Sepang 2009 FP1 5 riders covered by 1s FP2 8 riders covered by 1s QP 4 riders covered by 1s Typical splits between the top rider on each machine and the second on the same machine are in the 0.4s to 1.5s range. If the equivalent splits in this test session are less, it would be easy to explain it because; Everyone is a bit rusty after the break; they're spending most of the time *testing* not chasing a time; Several of the bikes are significantly different from last year; Bridgestone are also testing in exceptional heat; the sessions were upset by rain; Nobody wants to get hurt right now. And most everyone was quite a way off QP perhaps partly because there's not the same motivation to surf the edge. And in general team mates finish in the same order as they always do. So clearly it's completely obvious that:- - Ducati are building a bike for Stoner only and hurting all their other riders - Honda are building a bike for Pedrosa only and hurting all their other riders - Honda are giving the satellite teams an uncompetitive bike - Yamaha are giving Tech3 a detuned engine - Suzuki don't know how to do it, but Capirossi flatters what they bring - If you're not an ex-250 midget you haven't got a hope - Spies is the great white hope. It's not hard to find stuff to justify all of that. But after a while some of it just looks like fruitcake paranoid conspiracies. Or perhaps - Stoner really is an alien. He does actually have an alien ability to hit the edge on every single lap he does without falling off - Hayden isn't an alien. He's just plain slower than Stoner. Still faster than a lot of others but just not in the same league as the top 4 - Pedrosa has worked out how to use his light weight and is just plain faster then Dovi - Rossi and Lorenzo are very close in ability but they're both significantly faster than Edwards and always have been - The jury's still out on Spies. Maybe he's another Lorenzo. Maybe he's a bit better than Edwards. Maybe he'll have a year like Toseland's first. We'll see.
Perhaps so. Even you and Pablo won't be calling for his head until he goes three or four races without a win...
what's new. when it comes to 2010 predictions, a safe one is that consiracy theories will continue to rum amuck in RMR... jfk got shot by euromed midgets. i think Spies is amazing, and that he will show it with a top 5 position. i think Spies will do quite well in MotoGP. his approach is impeccable. and the Yamaha doiesn't seem to be any worse for not being geared towards midgets, since neither Rossi nor Edwards fall into that category. of course, if Edwards was Spanish.. can you imagine the rampant cries about favoritism despite lack of results would be uttered by our resident crusader against the evil euromed superpowers that constantly conspire against that meek helpless former colony...? never won a race on ce ion 7 years blah blah... geez, at least Checa *won* a race here and there. and was ten pounds heavier than that texas tornado :-D i don't worry about Spies much. he'll carve his place and will be champion in the next few years, no doubt. if anyone out there is more promising, i haven't met then yet. Pedrosa will *never* be champion. Stonr and Lorenzo make huge mistakes under pressure, and seem to seasoned to move away from that. like Schwantz back in the day, it will take for some higher force (i would not call that luck) to finally win their title despite having shown they can be very fast on a given day. within 2 years it'll be Rossi on a Ducati against Spies as the top Yamaha guy. let's dream.
5th in the championship. And yes, I do very well remember I bet on a MotoGP memory that will see you donate cash to a charity of my choice. :-D
Rossi should go to Kawasaki. The bike was good enough at one point but needed to be properly set up and ridden.
