2019 Ciudad del Motor de Aragón

michaelm said:

Sure, no-one should underestimate the money factor, although I think Jorge was on the outer with Ducati in general when he made his decision to leave; continuing to win races would likely have healed most ills, but the wins he did have probably came after the die was cast.

It is also a tough business cf Stoner being persona non grata at Ducati 3 years after winning their only title and Eddie Lawson ending up at Cagiva a couple of years after winning a 3rd title for Yamaha.

Pretty much everyone thought both Ducati and Honda were bad moves for Jorge. It is hard to know whether he might have finally got it together on the Honda as he did on the Ducati, he showed some signs of doing so before injury, but I think he is done for this year at least and maybe for good, he is no spring chicken now and repetitive injuries catch up with riders at his current stage in his career.

Jorge and Zarco both seem to have been influenced by not wanting to be on the same team as Rossi, Jorge with some cause imo; I don’t know if Jorge could have toughed it out although I think he got equal equipment if not his preferred tyre in 2016. I hope Zarco got plenty of Red Bull money, because KTM has been disastrous for him, and he won’t have Jorge’s 3 titles to console him.

Click to expand...

michaelm said:

Keshav said:

He started with top rider status, there was debate as to whether iannone or Dovi should be his team mate if you recall. Dovi greatly out performed him in 2017 pure and simple.

The only thing, and reportedly a cause of some of the rancour between him and Dovi, was whether he was a more significant contributor than Dovi to the quality of the bike with Gigi apparently on the Jorge side of the argument. At the moment there seems to be an impasse between Dovi and Gigi with Dovi back to the old make the Ducati into a Yamaha thing and Gigi apparently of the opinion this can’t be done and/or it being a bad idea to attempt this.

In the end if Jorge has made 2 ego driven major career decisions that is on him, fan of his though I am, and similarly if his decisions were mainly on the basis of the money on offer. Rossi didn’t repeat his Ducati error. It is also likely once it became obvious Rossi was on the decline Yamaha would have backed Jorge who did after all win them their last 3 titles, with anything held against him over 2015 forgotten.

Click to expand...

Timing is everything. Certainly was my understanding that by the time he started to turn things around, he was already half-way out the door and Ducati was determined to replace him.

The injuries of course have to be factored in longevity-wise. Rossi's ability to race for so many years with only one serious injury has been such HUGE factor in his staying power. Dani OTH was to my mind, something of a phenomenon, although another way of looking at it would be, he was just incredibly, obsessively determined to stay in it as long as possible, which in the end, I think he will live to regret. I'd hate to be him going through airport metal detectors.

I'm not sure I was ever fully aware that Lorenzo had top status on the team. His lack of performance relative to Dovi's had to have been a bitter pill to swallow.

Click to expand...