michaelm

Vinales is looking like a lesser version of Pedrosa, dominant on a good day but needing everything to be right to be so.

I can remember even before the tyre change people having their doubts about how Vinales would go when the show got to the season proper on the European tracks and those people have been proven right, although he had actually strung a few races together before the tyre change, which definitely affected Lorenzo.

p4p1

At that time a lot of the Vinales hype and praise was from certain fans in the hope that he could beat Marquez, because they knew their favourite wouldn’t.
Fabio so far is showing something a bit similar, not as bad but similar.

birdman

The Vinales criticism is a little harsh imo. Rossi is capable of playing mind games, of that there is little doubt. For example, Stoner won 07 in a canter and welcomed having Rossi on the same tires in 08. He then crashed out of multiple races and appeared flustered. Did that have any effect or was it all in Stoners head? Not quite the same with Vinales but then again perhaps not entirely different. Rossi stills wants to win after all, not get beaten by his team mate.

birdman

What this season proves beyond doubt: Marquez is the class of the field and without him they appear a little lost. That is not unexpected under the circumstances, they know full well the unique opportunity which exists and can’t seam to help tripping over each other in the rush to establish themselves as the top dog. Even Rossi, with all that experience......

michaelm

True. He did actually string some early season races together and it was after the finagling and tyre change that he started to look flaky, and doesn’t appear to have ever recovered his composure.

Lex whom I miss always had a theory that 2008 was a trial run for the control tyre and that it wasn’t the same high tech/multi edge/whatever tyre originally co-developed with Bridgestone to particularly suit the Ducati, which Stoner used to such advantage in 2007, in 2008. He also had early season problems in 2008 with a bike that steered even worse than previously on the tight tracks and a mechanical dnf leading to reversion to the 2007 engine. He was still making a bold return until Laguna Seca, after which he needed to beat Rossi pretty much in every race and win most of them. I put his subsequent offs down to pressure/rider error at the time, but Stoner always maintained it was the start of the bike becoming more capricious and throwing him off at random. Stoner was hardly unforthcoming in general however, and I don’t recall any specific complaint from him or Ducati about the 2008 tyres to confirm Lex’s hypothesis although there was considerable complaint about tyres in later years of course.

Keshav

Much as I'm not a big Rossi fan, I'd hesitate to blame his age for that fall. Could easily be just a question of that front rubber being slightly off from the rest of the batch, that, combined with a pretty cool ground temperature. Tho for him to fall two weeks in a row is really out of character since in either case, he didn't seem to be pushing that hard.

p4p1

I think it’s all pretty simple. He needs to push harder than ever (everyone does) to be on the podium. He can’t ride around and hope guys fall off to give him podiums. There’s too many good bikes now for that.

p4p1

I think it’s a fair conclusion given how everything went down, not to mention Stoner himself has said that he preferred the 07 tyres.

Bridgestone don’t want to supply Rossi, Dorna applies pressure to Bridgestone who eventually relent. Bridgestone become the sole tyre supplier in 2009, why would Bridgestone continue to favour Ducati and Stoner over Rossi, Dorna and the completely different Japanese bikes that make up the majority of the grid in 08 when they know what’s coming in 09? It’s not proof of anything but does anyone really believe that supplying Rossi in 08 has nothing to do with becoming the sole tyre supplier in 09?

Segfault

When did he win last time? I bet he had a win in his mind, he was second, could see the guy in front of him. Situation was promising and very different from his usual 5th place range.

Keshav

I don't doubt that he had it in him.