A long, exciting and close battle between Ducati riders Jorge Martin and Pecco Bagnaia came down to the checkered flag at the Sachsenring earlier today. Martin beat Pecco to the line by less than 1/10th of a second. Johann Zarco (Ducati) came home in third position 7 seconds back of the leaders.
After suffering his 5th crash of the weekend (in this morning’s warm up), which was a nasty high-side, Marc Marquez (Honda) chose not to start the race today.
The riders go at it again next weekend at the Assen circuit. Bagnaia continues to lead the championship points with Martin now in second position 16 points behind. For full results of today’s race, take a look here.
Witness the effects of greed. MoneyGP first goes four stroke and gobbles up factory support from other racing series. That was so costly that single source engines quickly became the answer in what was billed as a prototype racing series. Now even the frames are being sourced by mostly one manufacturer.
Then comes the electronics revolution that got so costly that it was brought under control. Single source again. So much for that prototype sales pitch…again.
Now it’s aero, pay up or look foolish. I wonder if they could simply ban aero. Take the wings away and you just know that the bikes are going to start looking very strange.
Is all this worth it? Can anyone make a case that road racing is in better shape now than it was 25 years ago? It’s certainly not selling any sport bikes.
What’s weird is what happened to motocross. The 250 class is where all the money goes. The 450s are so fast that the racers want a 350 displacement limit. No need to firehouse money at those things. But the 250s are getting diamond beryllium spendium engines that cost as much as a nice little lake home somewhere.
The glorification of obsolete equipment costs money. And it has done it’s level best to destroy everything in it’s wake.
They can pry my two stroke out of my cold dead hands and give it to some kid. If the kid takes decent care of it. It will serve him for decades. That’s why they don’t need a flashy racing series to sell like hot cakes.
“ Can anyone make a case that road racing is in better shape now than it was 25 years ago?”
Didn’t look up the 1998 MotoGP season’s results before you posted that, did you…
The Superbike season was awesome that year but those were all 4-strokes…
No I didn’t. But there were two vibrant Superbike series in 1998 weren’t there? How are those babies looking now? How well are they generating new talent now verses then? How many sport bikes are they selling?
People like to blame the kids for not being interested. But that sort of ignores the fact that they aren’t having trouble selling ten to twelve thousand dollar dirt bikes. Or the fact that the popular street bikes now resemble dirt bikes.
Whatever, road racing is broken. Instead of fixing it, they are continuing to double down again and again. Draing resources with one budgetary black hole after the next.
The popularity of things come and go. Nothing has changed about road racing and dirt biking (probably not as popular as you think..).
It isn’t up to the motorcycle industry to fix racing. They just chase the market with products.
Congrats Mick- day 2432 in a row with a mention of your two stroke.
kek he’s like the Energizer bunny
“The effects of greed” – are you kidding? The DESIRE TO WIN
Some people need slapped upside the head with a hardcover edition of Atlas Shrugged
Atlas Shrugged is an interesting thing for the rotters who bring it up to, well, bring it up.
Hasn’t all things road racing and sport bike totally caved in since the Atlas Shrugged types went for the jugular?
They banned the Rearden engine in favor of of an obsolete inferior product. Pretty much like Rearden Metal in the book. Then they proceeded to destroy their own market. You know, kind of like what happened in the book.
Did you even read the horribly preachy book?
I was a power plant operator. I pretty much read books for a living.
Prehaps you would like to enlighten us on just how MotoGP and the sportbike market is winning. With the crashed bike sales and dwindling viewership and all.
Motocross and dirt biking in general suffered badly from the rotters and their four strokes. But KTM, the Rearden of the dirt bike market, rescued it. And here we are. Dirt bikes for the win. Sport bikes? A victim of the rotters.
Happy reading! The soliloquy in that book is at least 125 pages long if I remember correctly. It’s like trying to make paint dry with eyeball movements.
I get a real kick out of the Atlas Shrugged types. Rotters every one of them.
At least we’re staying with fiction. That tracks…
LOL I stopped at the assertion that the 2-stroke is the “Rearden Engine”
It amuses me – I stopped at this point – that you consider the 2-stroke the “Rearden” (actually, that would be “Galt”) “Engine.”
Modern MotoGP bikes visualy look perfect but a kind of huge. Are they realy bigger?
Races in itself look strangely awesome.
They’re really long in terms of wheelbase. The riders are also mostly jockey-sized, making the bikes look even bigger.
MotoGP bikes have around a 56 inch wheelbase. Long compared to what?
The bikes are actually pretty small and I suspect Artem is commenting on how the small riders make the bikes look big?
My point was whether MotoGP bikes were smaller before. Let say, five or ten years ago. By the way I’ve heard that Valentino Rossi is rather tall.
Motoman is right, they aren’t really any longer than current superbikes. They were shorter back in the 2-stroke years but that was longer ago. Their size and weight have been pretty stable. The tail sections were in some cases much smaller (Pedrosa era Honda) before the implementation of the ride height devices that now occupy that space.
For a long time Ducati couldn’t get it done….how quickly we forget. I say ban aero but, Ducati and their supporters won’t go for it. I’m pro Honda,Yamaha, Suzuki, and Marquez by the way….along with the Euros. Good racing is just that. Crashing because You are over the limit is not entertainment.
VFRMANE
i’m a fan of numerous manufactures of two wheeled motorized vehicles (i’ve happily owned japanese and euro).
i don’t believe in banning aero and other modern tech just because Ducati chose to and has best implemented them.
what Ducati has done to get them to the front of the pack was not sneaky/secret/illegal and was NOT unavailable to all the other manufactures along the way.
why the others chose not invest/commit in aero and stuff was/is their choice and now they are paying the price for not investing.
leave Ducati out of their mess up.
ducati paid up big time and are now reaping rewards just as any other manufacturer would be if they had done the same.
i’d rather see the disadvantaged bikes removed from competing as they are little more than fodder and more of a hazard and danger at the higher and higher speeds of today. make MotoGP a ducati (and KTM) cup…it doesn’t bother me.
in the mean time Honda/Yamaha/Suzuki/Kawasaki can use their time away to do what they want and need to do if they want to safely comeback to compete.
“ducati paid up big time and are now reaping rewards”
This describes FIM’s failure of foresight. We’ve been here before in a sense. Before the series went to the spec ECU the cost of electronics was choking out everyone but Honda and Yamaha who were well ahead of everyone else. The class was truly dying and the rules changed to save it. If Honda and Yamaha don’t step up their investment and catch up, then they may be inclined to fold up their tents and leave. Dorna/FIM would have to change the rules to prevent that from happening, as well as changing the distribution of teams so that all makes are fielding a minimum of 4 bikes at any given time, meaning Ducati would have to lose a team to make room for another pair of Yamahas.
If the rules don’t change to balance the competition out and Yamaha + Honda were lost, Aprilia (who seem to have lost a step lately) couldn’t be too far behind. Being second tier is one thing, being designated punching bag is untenable from a marketing standpoint.
Who wishes Honda dropped out of MotoGP and Suzuki stayed on? Honda makes perfectly adequate, reasonably priced, class filling bikes. And just like the MotoGP these bikes are not winning much. I think times are changing and the Japanese manufacturers are done. I read a commentary that the EU will be the next world power. Well their bikes certainly are.
I’ve been retired from the company for six years now so I don’t have any inside rumors on new MotoGP bike development going on at Yamaha but I can tell you that it is not in the company’s nature to stop racing. It got its start by winning races and it’s worldwide reputation through racing. However I can give you a tip on how to determine if something new and hopefully better is in the pipeline. Watch Fabio’s contract negotiations. If he signs for another two years then big changes are in the works and you can expect either a new bike, a new engine or both. I suspect they will finally give up on the losing battle of handling over power and come with a V4 that has been in development for two or more years already so that Fabio can go back to qualifying up front. If he’s gone then they’ve not shown him anything that he believes can win.
It’s far too late to write off Japanese bikes altogether, but it is impossible to ignore the fact that their revenue base is suffering. Japanese motor vehicles, including cars, continue to be supply constrained. I look for the emergence of bikes from other regions where sales (and revenue) are healthier. I fully expect there will be competitive race bikes from Korea and China within 5 years.
I do still watch the Yamaha annual financial reports and overall the company is doing very well in all divisions and was ahead of plan last year in motorcycles. The markets in South Asia and Oceania are still growing so they still have the Yen to put into racing if they want to.
Honda is world #1 and the other Japanese makes area all also very strong globally. The US market is a minor player in their global portfolios. Despite that I see Honda motorcycles bikes all over the place here in the mid-west, as well as their dirt bikes, ATV’s and SxS UTV’s. I think they’re doing better than you think they are.
I just wish Honda and Yamaha hadn’t lost their way in GP so the two best riders in the world were able to compete more evenly against their rivals.
and where was bradl?
MotoDucati.
Quickly losing interest.
There was a time when all was MotoHonda, when Doohan won five consecutive titles, followed by more Hondas… the best must win (bike + pilot) , and this is fine for me.
To me what has been more interesting since Ducati came to prominence is that MotoGP is no longer a 3-horse race. Many riders can win. I probably wouldn’t care if it was a spec class ala’ Moto2, so long as the racing is close and competitive. In that aspect, MotoGP is far healthier these past 4-5 years than it’s ever been in its prior history.
both the sprint and the feature were superb exhibitions of motorcycle skill from riders and their crews, and the commentators STILL lament that “too bad marquez didn’t race”. i say who needs him. altho five crashes in three days IS entertaining…
Naka said he was following MM when MM crashed in Warm-up and that MM did nothing wrong. Naka stated the he himself was (is) concerned about the crash (the bike obviously and Honda for making them all ride that piece of sh!t) and which they all (all Honda pilots) should be concerned.
the other non-Honda riders/teams on the track should all be concerned too knowing that the Hondas are simply going to torpedo them at any time or moment (a’la Zarco).
Quarto stated MM should be congratulated for his action at the German GP which I understand to mean for his decision not to “try” and ride that piece of sh!t death trap and likely crash it into someone else.
I would be extremely glad to see Yamaha and Honda leave MotoGP (immediately/much sooner than later) if those maufacturers aren’t going to commit to the sport like Ducati (and KTM is now doing) has. Suzuki left. Honda and Yamaha are too stubborn or stupid.
Unlike many other -demented idiots- who wish death upon MM I would like not to learn he (FQ and the other Yamaha/Honda pilots) joined the list of dead or terribly injured while simply trying to do their jobs. obviously the other japanese team’s riders aren’t willng to risk injury/death for a race near as much as MM is so much less crashes from them.
MotoGP is the Ducati Cup.
Ducati deserves the win as they have spent a lot $$$ to have the best aerodynamics and launch control on the grid let alone the number of teams and riders.
I learned KTM has taken a lesson from Ducati and hired the same aero company as Ducati. Honda and Yamaha are not taking aero as serious (yet?) and that speaks to me that they are done and leaving. no use having power if you can’t make the tires stick the tarmac, right marc?
KTM works with Red Bull F1 for aero and Ducati works with Ferrari F1. Not sure if Aprilia also works with Ferrari but think they do.
KTM has the best launch control. The KTMs rocket past everyone at the start.
The best solution would be to get ride of the wings and other aero tidbits to bring the cost down.
I don’t know…Jack Miller recently stated that Ducati has (had?) the best launch control. I’d guess he should know coming off a Ducati ride and now riding a KTM or I read something wrong. Either way doesn’t matter.
The thing that is spoiling MotoGp for me is the japanese manufactuers sleeping on the new trick bits and such WHICH IS CAUSING a lot of hazards/danger on the track because some disadvantaged pilots are riding beyoned their bikes trying to keep up with the advantaged pilots’ bikes.
Honda has their own F1 team and other 4 wheel racing teams therefor i’d think the 2 wheeled Honda folks could have requested assistance from the vast Honda 4 wheeled aero expertise regarding aero? Yamaha and Suzuki not so lucky.
Nice tight race on a fabulous circuit. Ducati everywhere with a sprinkle of KTM and Aprilia. Honda and Yamaha the once mighty icons of GP racing in both generations, four and two stroke now withered into pipe smoke. Perhaps the departure of Suzuki was signal of the end times of the Japanese involvement in Moto GP. Honda and Yamaha haven’t kept pace in development and show no interest going forward. I suddenly feel the need to own a Ducati.
I’d say this probably seals it for MM….
It should. Only a matter of time before he seriously injures himself and/or someone else.
I’m kinda surprised Repsol hasn’t peeled their name off of these Honda toilets.
agree!!!
i’ve not clicked on one yet but there are plenty of youtube clickbait vids with the title Repsol is flushing Honda.