Stoner with wife Adriana during the Ducati era: Stoner prefers his wife as his umbrella girl.
Our friends at Solo Moto dropped a bombshell by publishing a story that indicates Casey Stoner is contemplating retirement from MotoGP at the end of this season. Stoner is only 26 years old, but is already a two-time MotoGP world champion. It is well-known in the paddock that Stoner’s young family, including his wife and newborn daughter, are extremely important to him. After Jerez last weekend, Stoner flew home to Switzerland to be with his wife and daughter for a few days before heading to Estoril for this weekend’s race.
Although he already has 34 wins in MotoGP, Stoner has said publicly he does not care about setting records. He views MotoGP has his job, nothing more.
Honda is reportedly desperate to extend his contract beyond the end of this year. Understandable.
Well if you need the riders to act like clowns to “do their job” so be it.
Stoner is as much doing his job as Mick Doohan did, that is making the other riders (particularly Rossi, who I am still a big fan of) look silly, by doing his talking on the track.
You think his riding is robotic? I assume you mean consistent? Isn’t that the point in Formula One Motorsport to be precise ? This is not superbikes.
I don’t understand why everyone expects him to be the big personality, he is contracted as a motorcycle racer and currently he does that better than everyone else. I find him VERY entertaining.
When he was on inferior machinery he coped it, now he is o the best and winning a bit easier he still gets a hard time. Remember Rossi has had the best for his entire career, Stoner only has it now for the first time.
Seems he can’t do anything right to some people?
Any yes I do believe he is thinking about retiring, and now he has his first child and wants to spend time with here instead of flying all around the work, I totally understand. After all he has been traveling racing bikes for all his working life and a bit more!
I travel overseas for work and it is very taxing. Mind you if I earned what he did, it would be more bearable 🙂
Go Casey, get another job, you have lost the passion for the sport, You are no Rossi, Edwards or Sic. These guys have a passion for the “JOB”. You give nothing back to the sport you, your riding and your media is Robotic.When push comes to shove the fans are paying for a show so technically Casey your not doing your job. Do us all a favour take your bat and ball and GO! p.s. im Australian
Passion is verry important for bike riders, it is not a job to be a racer of any kind, not F1 neither motogp and you can ask Pastor Maldonado about it. Yes, you dont ride for the records but you do ride to win or beat others to it so he ussually is talking crap. I think he loves for his family and the death of simoncelli made a big mark on him and he wont ride NOT because he lost his passion (that is crap) but because of his family and what may happen to him; you may said he is scared and that is not shame but on the contrary a brave desicion however as usual Stoner keep his private life to himself which is the right thing to do. But for once, he would be more likeable when instead of talking crap like he does ussually just keep it to himself and that would be more understandable. He no like the media and he dont care about the fans and that is fine but stop trying to insult the fan intelligence by talking stuff we know it is not the real reason…
Is it not true that in the first 70% of the 2007 season Stoner’s bike was pulling far ahead of the competition (even Honda) on the straights? A pro AMA bike builder I know said the Duck had an extreme power advantage. Was the above advantage more the result of Stoner’s riding ability than the Duck’s HP advantage?
I dunno, what you mean the same sorts of advantage Rossi had over the field in the first HondaGp (opps! sorry) MotoGP season??? Could be, could be. Looks at how amazingly well all the other riders have done on Ducatis…….
IF Ducati was doing so well why Stoner move? try to defend a rider who suddenly decide to leave one brand to get into other while being on the top but he has his reasons. It is obvious Ducati couldnt keep the trend form big factories and you could see that in stoner final rides on ducati. Riders that are on the top will try to keep pn the top by going somewhere they are being offer the bike that can do it. The oppsoite occurs when you feel the factory will concetrate rather more on new blood than you which was the case on Valentino so it was time for him to leave. The main problem to build any kind of machinary is the people DRIVING or RIDING style. It like putting Button to drive a car Schumacher drove when he won championships. Both of them are champions but schumacher driving style completly different from Button. Same goes with a bike, Ducati, that was build around Stoner and someone else comes in with a completly difference riding style. Jut put Stoner on the Yamaha that took Rossi to his championship and you will see winning nothing.
Casey has now come out and said this rumor is not true.
Not exactly. Part of what he said is “I haven’t decided what I am doing…”.
That is true, but Here is what Casey actualy said in context:
“Everyone seems quite good at stories and making them up for sure,” Stoner said.
“I’ve said many times before my career is not going to keep going for long. I won’t be going into my middle 30s or anything like that.
“But until you hear it out of my mouth, don’t listen to anything you read.”
He is now 26, still a fair way off mid 30s.
Man! We thought NFL players had a short professional lifespan!
Ive seen an interview where casey likes the outdoor life and he’s always seemed to be a private person. He’ll have made his money and if he wants to ride off into the sunset, fit and young, why not? I thin his awkward and contrary personality on camera is due to his dislike of the roadshow-side of MotoGP. If he looks at Simoncelli, or Doohan and his injuries, you couldn’t knock it. If he wins this years championship, he’ll have nothing left to prove.
As far as legcy is concerned, Rossi is erroding his on a weekly basis now. Stoner can see that when you’re on top, there’s only one direction you can go in….
I’m sure Honda will convince him (financially) to race another year, but if they can’t I can only say congrats to a great rider, and a deserving champion, and may you and your family have a great life.
These guys take a lot of risks. The thought of crashing at the speeds these guys are racing at scares the beejeesus out of me. It’s got to enter their heads from time to time. maybe Casey is listening to that cautionary voice now, where he used to ignore it. It happened to me on the street. I used to ride like I was one of those guys, truthfully, suprised I survived, now I ride like an old lady.
I know after the deaths of 3 friends recently (by natural causes..mostly cancer)who were all younger than I, I am considering retirement even though I feel I could work another 5 years, and spending some time at home with my family, doing thigs I want to do, rather than just working for my company every day ….. and I don’t have Casey’s bank account to fall back on. What good is money if you’re dead?
Ever notice the way a contract comes up for renegotiation and suddenly the rider is considering retiring, or he’s seen doing test laps in Formula 1 cars, or he’s racing rally cars?
He can go play golf with Lorena Ochoa 🙂 That one hurt too. It is understandable though. Family is important. Might as well go out on top. Casey would be missed though.
He’s negotiating for a one year contract. He’ll ride in 2013 for Honda and then have a serious look at retirement before the rule changes come in 2014.
By then he might come around to the changes though. He was 100% dead-set against racing in Japan last year too.
A more logical improvement in safety would be tire and suspension limits. Most of the serious injuries occur in high side accidents. The problem is how to reduce corner speed without tire reliability issues. The situation is made worse with the 1000cc limit and heavier engines. They increase displacement and then go to rpm limits to bring power back down. This does not make sense. It is a marketing thing: sportbikes are 600 and 1000 cc, so they think they need a 1000 gp class to sell 1000 sportbikes. Maybe Stoner sees the risk factor increasing over the next few years.
He’s making more in a few years that many of us make in a lifetime. He obviously is not one of the playboy glamour types in it for that side of the lifestyle. He has been on the road, racing motorcycles for 12 years. Chaz Davies told stories of him and Casey living a very hard life on the road in the early days. No hotels. No motor homes. He has been a great rider and has nothing to prove. More time with family. Good for him.
+1 +1 +1
If i were in his shoes, i would retire in a heartbeat! Plus his shoees would likely be killing me, what with those diminutive feet…
re: “It is well-known in the paddock that Stoner’s young family, including his wife and newborn daughter, are extremely important to him.”
actually, it’s not well known (and therein lies the problem). while i don’t think it’ll be the end of this season, the time is rapidly approaching where casey will issue a “reality check” (cash upon receipt) to the modern day fans of the sport.
I always admire athletes who exited at the top, rather than fade into obscurity. Few manage it. They develop enormous egos and can’t bring themselves to step out of the limelight. If Stoner retires I will miss his uncommon racing talent. But I won’t stop being a fan. Quite the contrary.
I imagine quite a few riders have been contemplating retirement since Simoncelli’s death last year. I hope Stoner stays in but I certainly won’t blame him if he doesn’t.
He is looking pretty old in the picture, I’m not surprised about his retirement. Maybe he’s just upset that Cal Crutchlow has a prettier umbrella girl, you know how these Prima Donna types are.
A month or so ago in a moto mag, Stoner was quoted as saying that if/when Moto Gp becomes Moto 2 with spec engines,etc… that he would quit.
Maybe this is a shot across the bow to the heads of Moto Gp…
or just rumor…
I’m not saying this as a dig, because I do believe he and Lorenzo are the top two riders right now, and I respect his talent immensely. But let’s be honest here, his first championship was on a Ducati which was probably the most dominant bike horsepower wise (compared to its competition) of any bike I’ve seen in the last 10 years. The second most dominant…his Honda from last season. In Sunday’s race, horsepower was the difference the last 2 laps. Bottom line, he’s been probably the biggest beneficiary of dominant bikes of any current MotoGP rider. If I were him I wouldn’t want spec engines either.
While motorcycling would ultimately be the loser if spec bikes ever do happen, it would make for tighter racing. I would love watching he and Lorenzo go head to head on identical bikes.
As far as retirement, if I had his beautiful young family, and his money, I would retire too. This is an incredibly dangerous sport, and probably best left to the single, childless guys. But his talent would be missed.
I’m with the thought that MotoGP has no business being spec racing. It’s as much, or more, about the technology as it is the riders. I like to see what the factories can develop even more than rooting on a favored rider. Let MotoGP be the open class, let others do as they will.
Moto GP cannot continue to be an open class. Nobody want’s to pay in the $$ necessary to sustain it. Even with the uncompetitive CRT bikes the field is very small. Moto2 consistently provides far better racing. MotoGP has to go spec/control or die, just the way it is..
Then I say it should die. Do not pretend it’s something it’s not but call it what it would become. Open would not truly be open.
Can you name one person, including 2 former Moto GP champions (one arguably the best ever), a former 250 champion, and former WSB champions, who has been consistently competitive on the Ducati Moto GP bike in any of it’s incarnations OTHER than Stoner? No you can’t. The most horsepower does not make you the fastest. As Ducati has shown with everyone other than Stoner it usually makes you slower. Ducati a “dominant” bike? Ah, no. Honda a “dominant” bike? Maybe a better arguement there, but how many 800cc MotoGP championships did they win? One? And who was riding it?
re: “Ducati a “dominant” bike? Ah, no. Honda a “dominant” bike? Maybe a better arguement there, but how many 800cc MotoGP championships did they win? One? And who was riding it”?
ease down craig, you’re not listening. he’s speaking in the context of season ’07. that year the disparity in top end was definitely the largest we’d ever seen in a decade. this because the japanese were hoping to “de-escalate” the arms race that had begun with the 990 era. the italians of course never got that memo so to paraphrase history, the first year of 800’s ultimately conspired to do nothing more than “awake a sleeping giant”.
In 2007, two excellent Ducati riders could do no better than 7th (Loris Capirossi) and 10th (Alex Barros). Take Stoner out of the picture and history would say the 2007 Ducati sucked, finishing behind a gaggle of Honda, Yamaha and Suzuki riders. Just sayin’ ( I hate that phrase).
thanks Dirk!!!
waiting to hear that from someone else.
according to Motogp.com, sounds like that’s just a rumor that Casey denies.
sounds like a Rossi Fan that was upset with a couple of seasons of total dominance by anyone other than Valentino. Stoner was never given credit for winning based on talent. Others had the bike and didn’t win.
We never hear the 3 years of Yamaha dominance were due to a superior bike, just superior riders…
(I have a Rossi R1 so I’m always rooting Yamaha)
Say it ain’t so Casey! Or is this just a ploy to encourage Honda to get their fat cheque book out?
bingo – we have a winner
standard negotiations/sales technique called “The Take-Away”.
First thing i thought was…he better bloody not
but then again he has done everything he can do
go enjoy the rest of your life with his riches he has earned
Why such an old photo? Anyway, Stoner retire? I’ll believe it when I see it. He has quite a few more prime years left in racing. I can’t imagine him walking away. I know a few guys who would be thrilled if he did though…