Bridgepoint to bring MotoGP and WSBK under one umbrella

cliché guevara said:

just joking

when i'm at home and find the time to post on a forum i'm always wasted.

+ theres only one lil bald rocket ....... on the web and he happens to be here

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No seriously, why do people have so many different internet identities. Why would you not be the same person on all forums. I would be interested in hearing from those who use alternate identities as to why they do it.

i've got so many personalities and voices in my head, one character just isn't enough.

no really, thats it. who says i'm not one of the smart guys at motomatters for example?

i'm pretty sure that for example a guy like arrabi wouldn't want his good powerslide reputation to be tainted (oh ......here come the discussions whether it could be after 9 glorious posts) by his drunken,chav alter-ego over at crash.net which he probably uses to have some fun

povol said:

Why do people use different names on different discussion forums. I have never understood that.

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Because some people have creativity, Mr. Povol.

Jumkie said:

Because some people have creativity, Mr. Povol.

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Is that what it is, creativity. Are they that creative in real life. Or would that be considered a multiple personality disorder.

We all have multiple personas, Pov. At work Pov ain't the same as husband/father Pov, who ain't the same as beer and buddies and bikes Pov. This is one of only two forums I frequent but I would guess peeps just feel different in different Internet situations and don't feel the need to be burdened with one name as we are in life... Though that's not really true either... We have/use different names/nicknames with different groups of friends and in different anyway, so I'm not really getting your consternation on Internet I'd.

cliché guevara said:

just joking

when i'm at home and find the time to post on a forum i'm always wasted.

+ theres only one lil bald rocket ....... on the web and he happens to be here

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Excuse me!!!

Thats "MR" lil bald rocket ....... to you!!! ha ha ha

sorry dad

L8Braker said:

Interesting post Zoot...I for one would like to see the AMA/BSB rules fall in line with WSBK or AMA and WSBK rules follow BSB. With a similiar rules package it would be easier for riders in those series to audition for a spot in the world series wouldn't it?

Not happy that Uncle Carmelo has control of the motorcycle world championships, can't be good for the long term.

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The FIM have indicated they would like all national championships and international to have same/similar tech specs. Naturally Honda are unhappy with that. 0.o



To that, I say - .... You Honda! Nowhere to run now, is there?

Andy Roo said:

Motogp needs all of those brands and really, the marques of motorcycling to give it back its pantomime and credibility.

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During what is called the 'golden age' of GP racing, there was really only one really successful manufacturer - Yamaha. They made it by selling turnkey prototype racers - you had the money, you turned up at the track, were scrutineered, ran a qualifying session and raced. Honda quickly got the message and joined in, Suzuki had a bash and were moderately successful and Kawasaki tried, but didn't achieve much outside 250cc.



From that, Honda and Yamaha dominated the sport through 2000. Honda, being the bigger and richer managed more wins than the Piano Tuners. But not so much as to be over-awing.



That's what Ezpeleta wants to see return by making things tough on the factories and easy on CRT. Turnkey racers, more competition, a racing spectacle like we have had this season in WSBK.



We are so used to seeing only a couple of teams dominate in MotoGP that we have forgotten that it doesn't have to be that way. That privateers with a good basic bike and rules that don't change every 10 minutes could transform this sport.



If you want close racing, the longer you keep the rules static the closer the teams become in performance. If you keep changing them, only the very well-heeled teams with hundred-million-dollar R&D efforts will prevail.



But it really doesn't matter which brands - as long as there is competition. If Honda left tomorrow, MotoGP wouldn't lose 4B viewers... the slack would be picked up by other manufacturers - maybe even some new ones or some old ones coming back (Bimota, MV, Harris, Kawasaki, Czysz, BMW, Aprilia, etc.).



We need competitive bikes, we don't need prima-donna's like Honda threatening the sport every time a rule change doesn't suit them.



Let them go - the sport will continue.

michaelm said:

Sure, but the series is based on honda engines and hence requires co-operation from honda. If honda won't play and they have to rely on second hand engines from honda road bikes, or new engines from hyosung, even dorna might have trouble dressing moto 2 up as an elite bike racing series, and the problem would imo be much greater if they attempted to extend the model to moto 1.

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Honda currently have the contract to supply - that can change. The new engines would be given certain specs to follow - ECU, mounting points, weight, power. You wouldn't know the difference unless you worked in the pits or rode the thing.

michaelm said:

Again sure, and suzuki or kawasaki might even see a chance to even old scores with relative economy, but arguably unless it is yamaha it is second best;

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What makes you think that? MV, Suzuki, Kawasaki, Rotax, CCM, KTM, all make engines that would suit - Honda and Yamaha aren't the engineering genius' you think - they are the ones that spend the most money promoting their products and have managed to sit at the top of sales, doesn't mean they can't make a damned fine engine.



I suggest you learn how, then go and ride the current crop of 600cc bikes and see for yourself. Personally, I am not a fan of the Honda. The Honda engine is fragile, the ergonomics are made for Pedrosa. The Yamaha is a really comfortable and fast bike, but not suited to my heavy-handed approach. The MV is much more my style, being expensive, exclusive, exotic and uncomfortable



And before you write off the Hyosung, don't forget who makes the bulk of Suzuki mid-range engines these days... the Hyosung 650 is a rebadged SV. I like them, nice engine, full of character and there aren't many mid-range twins out there any more.

r6 as a comfortable bike?

really?!

i thought the 2003 cbr600rr was the best thing to get if youre looking for a gp look a like that won't shatter your wrists on the normal road ,but the r6 is just way too extreme if you don't plan on going to the track more often than say, to work on it

Zootalaws said:

Honda currently have the contract to supply - that can change. The new engines would be given certain specs to follow - ECU, mounting points, weight, power. You wouldn't know the difference unless you worked in the pits or rode the thing.







What makes you think that? MV, Suzuki, Kawasaki, Rotax, CCM, KTM, all make engines that would suit - Honda and Yamaha aren't the engineering genius' you think - they are the ones that spend the most money promoting their products and have managed to sit at the top of sales, doesn't mean they can't make a damned fine engine.



I suggest you learn how, then go and ride the current crop of 600cc bikes and see for yourself. Personally, I am not a fan of the Honda. The Honda engine is fragile, the ergonomics are made for Pedrosa. The Yamaha is a really comfortable and fast bike, but not suited to my heavy-handed approach. The MV is much more my style, being expensive, exclusive, exotic and uncomfortable

And before you write off the Hyosung, don't forget who makes the bulk of Suzuki mid-range engines these days... the Hyosung 650 is a rebadged SV. I like them, nice engine, full of character and there aren't many mid-range twins out there any more.

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Mastermind, special topic the bleeding obvious. I am well aware that if you have a spec series it doesn't matter what the spec engine is. I actually said myself they can make it a hyosung if they like. My objection is to spec series, a personal view. Dorna can and will have moto 1 with hyosung engines if they like; it will not be gp bike racing in my view, but if you like it good for you. The gp racing I have watched for 27 years has had yamahas and hondas racing mainly, who have won a pretty well exactly equal number of riders championships, with suzuki being quite competitive early in the modern era as, being literate, I am also aware. The changes in the winning ratio between honda and yamaha in the 500 era also seemed to me at times to relate somewhat to the quality of the riders riding for the given manufacturer at the time (as did some of the 990 and 800 championships), but obviously this was also a mere assumption, and eddie lawson fortuitously picked a year when the honda was superior to ride for them.

michaelm said:

Mastermind, special topic the bleeding obvious. I am well aware that if you have a spec series it doesn't matter what the spec engine is. I actually said myself they can make it a hyosung if they like. My objection is to spec series, a personal view. Dorna can and will have moto 1 with hyosung engines if they like; it will not be gp bike racing in my view, but if you like it good for you. The gp racing I have watched for 27 years has had yamahas and hondas racing mainly, who have won a pretty well exactly equal number of riders championships, with suzuki being quite competitive early in the modern era as, being literate, I am also aware. The changes in the winning ratio between honda and yamaha in the 500 era also seemed to me at times to relate somewhat to the quality of the riders riding for the given manufacturer at the time (as did some of the 990 and 800 championships), but obviously this was also a mere assumption, and eddie lawson fortuitously picked a year when the honda was superior to ride for them.

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Apart from the personal ad-hominem attack, what you said was: "[font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif][background=rgb(247, 247, 247)]Sure, but the series is based on honda engines and hence requires co-operation from honda. If honda won't play and they have to rely on second hand engines from honda road bikes"[/background][/font]



Which just isn't true. Honda have a contract - they can't (and wouldn't) walk away from that. The rest of your summation was just rubbish.

cliché guevara said:

r6 as a comfortable bike?

really?!

i thought the 2003 cbr600rr was the best thing to get if youre looking for a gp look a like that won't shatter your wrists on the normal road ,but the r6 is just way too extreme if you don't plan on going to the track more often than say, to work on it

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Different strokes. I have always found the ergonomics of the Yamahas to be better than the competition. For a real ball/wrist buster, the GSXR is hard to beat

Zootalaws said:

Apart from the personal ad-hominem attack, what you said was: "[font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif][background=rgb(247, 247, 247)]Sure, but the series is based on honda engines and hence requires co-operation from honda. If honda won't play and they have to rely on second hand engines from honda road bikes"[/background][/font]



Which just isn't true. Honda have a contract - they can't (and wouldn't) walk away from that. The rest of your summation was just rubbish.

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Ad hominem/personal attacks (a tautology if I wanted to be pedantic in imitation of you) are obviously only a problem if indulged in by other people. Even if I had known nothing about bike racing or bikes before I joined the forum, and conceding the possibility that none of these posts are very cogent, the number I have made would seem to indicate that I can read and am interested, so you could perhaps have deduced that I might be aware of honda's, yamaha's and suzuki's history in the sport, and that kawasaki and suzuki make fairly reasonable road bikes. We have actually recently discussed hyosung's involvement with suzuki for that matter.



My point which I saw no need to spell out is that the putative moto 1 will be dependent on the co-operation of a manufacturer, or manufacturers, obviously not necessarily honda. If it is not honda or yamaha for "moto 1" then it will likely be a manufacturer formerly beaten by honda and yamaha in the premier class, or one with no tradition in the sport at all. It may or may not produce close racing, but it will not imo be premier class gp bike racing, but some new form of the sport. I also think it is possible all the japanese manufacturers might decide it is not worth their while as has happened previously in this and other bike racing series.



If you want a spec racing series run by investment bankers that's fine. It may well become more popular than what has gone before, this being in the interests of the bankers which are likely to be purely profit, and short term profit at that. I don't know if you have noticed, but the investment banker approach to business has run in to a few problems recently, and even if successful is likely imo to be at the cost of the authenticity of the sport.

michaelm said:

My point which I saw no need to spell out is that the putative moto 1 will be dependent on the co-operation of a manufacturer, or manufacturers, obviously not necessarily honda.

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It's not about spelling anything out - you have made two completely different statements evincing two different veiwpoints but are saying they were the same thing? So why did you say: "the series is based on honda engines and hence requires co-operation from honda. If honda won't play and they have to rely on second hand engines from honda road bikes" if you actually meant "[font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]that the putative moto 1 will be dependent on the co-operation of a manufacturer, or manufacturers, obviously not necessarily honda. If it is not honda or yamaha for "moto 1" then it will likely be a manufacturer formerly beaten by honda and yamaha in the premier class, or one with no tradition in the sport at all." - when we were discussing Moto2? After all, there ar many manufacturers in Moto1, not just Honda.[/font]



I have no issue what you said in your most recent post - it puts your viewpoint forward that Honda make the best engines and without them it isn't 'premier class gp bike racing' - that's your opinion and you are entitled to it.



What I have an issue with, which you seem more keen to move goalposts around rather than admit is a fallacy, is that the series is reliant on the good graces of Honda and if they pull out, will be forced to buy second-hand engines.



The engines for this year are allocated, the contract with Motorland Aragon to inspect, rebuild and tune them in place. If Honda walked away today, nothing would change - so your post was wrong. I know you don't like it that you were wrong and are finding any way around that, including shooting the messenger, but it doesn't make it any less wrong. If Honda walked away next year, it wouldn't change. Parts would still be available, Motorland Aragon would keep working on them and delivering fresh engines to races.



You followed up with a post professing a different viewpoint - all well and good - it doesn't change that you made a prior, incorrect, statement that I pointed out was a fallacy.



Retrospectively changing what you say may work for Mitt Romney with uninformed voters, but your post is quoted - it's what you said, and it's incorrect.

Zootalaws said:

During what is called the 'golden age' of GP racing, there was really only one really successful manufacturer - Yamaha. They made it by selling turnkey prototype racers - you had the money, you turned up at the track, were scrutineered, ran a qualifying session and raced. Honda quickly got the message and joined in, Suzuki had a bash and were moderately successful and Kawasaki tried, but didn't achieve much outside 250cc.



From that, Honda and Yamaha dominated the sport through 2000. Honda, being the bigger and richer managed more wins than the Piano Tuners. But not so much as to be over-awing.



That's what Ezpeleta wants to see return by making things tough on the factories and easy on CRT. Turnkey racers, more competition, a racing spectacle like we have had this season in WSBK.



We are so used to seeing only a couple of teams dominate in MotoGP that we have forgotten that it doesn't have to be that way. That privateers with a good basic bike and rules that don't change every 10 minutes could transform this sport.



If you want close racing, the longer you keep the rules static the closer the teams become in performance. If you keep changing them, only the very well-heeled teams with hundred-million-dollar R&D efforts will prevail.



But it really doesn't matter which brands - as long as there is competition. If Honda left tomorrow, MotoGP wouldn't lose 4B viewers... the slack would be picked up by other manufacturers - maybe even some new ones or some old ones coming back (Bimota, MV, Harris, Kawasaki, Czysz, BMW, Aprilia, etc.).



We need competitive bikes, we don't need prima-donna's like Honda threatening the sport every time a rule change doesn't suit them.



Let them go - the sport will continue.

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I believe the turnkey racer is now an anachronism, in a lengthier post I made a reference to the Norton featherbed frames and stated (in summary) - Post war (WWII) and for some time, there was an excess of materials and persons able to work those materials.



Steel is far less complicated than exotic materials like alloys and carbon fibre. The number of specialists available to work those materials is far less now and the cost (even or especially the relative cost) of developing those materials is now much greater.



To name a few, wind tunneling computer modelling materials and constructions. electronic suspension, brakes made from ceramics or carbon fibre and so on.



1. Most of these are now on production bikes.

2. Production bikes are very fast.

3. The turnkey racers will struggle to make times against teams (i.e Repsol Honda and Yamaha factory) that have big financial backing. Even if there is 1 engine the Marky Mark situation in moto2 is enough to tell us that even a little % difference in backing can make a winning% on track.

4. What's the point of factories making race replica superbikes unless someone races them?

5. You slow motogp down, WSBK pounces. If you then buy WSBK and slow it down the rebel series pounces. racing is like flying "speed is life".

6. And most importantly (my focus, my zen and anger all in one) WSBK isn't broken. Forget all that stuff about how it evolved and isn't what it was meant to be. It works. It may be pseudo motogp on paper but no one races on paper. On the track it is brilliant. (Without google) I think 10 winners on 4 different makes of bike in a season is amazing, there is no reason to mess with that formula.



Motogp should fix its problems without interfering with WSBK, I don't see the pragmatic point of taking two series, 1 working and 1 struggling and fixing them by breaking the working one. If race series were cars Caramel Ezpop would walk everywhere. Surely you know guy who owns lots of bikes and none of them work. The guy with 1 working bike is so much better off.



Totally separate and without google Didn't cyzcz make a beautiful transverse v4 thingy a while ago?



I wanted to see that developed and raced, it looked awesome.



Double Edit - Zootalaws is the Frank Zappa song right? - have I asked the obvious?

Zootalaws said:

It's not about spelling anything out - you have made two completely different statements evincing two different veiwpoints but are saying they were the same thing? So why did you say: "the series is based on honda engines and hence requires co-operation from honda. If honda won't play and they have to rely on second hand engines from honda road bikes" if you actually meant "[font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]that the putative moto 1 will be dependent on the co-operation of a manufacturer, or manufacturers, obviously not necessarily honda. If it is not honda or yamaha for "moto 1" then it will likely be a manufacturer formerly beaten by honda and yamaha in the premier class, or one with no tradition in the sport at all." - when we were discussing Moto2? After all, there ar many manufacturers in Moto1, not just Honda.[/font]



I have no issue what you said in your most recent post - it puts your viewpoint forward that Honda make the best engines and without them it isn't 'premier class gp bike racing' - that's your opinion and you are entitled to it.



What I have an issue with, which you seem more keen to move goalposts around rather than admit is a fallacy, is that the series is reliant on the good graces of Honda and if they pull out, will be forced to buy second-hand engines.



The engines for this year are allocated, the contract with Motorland Aragon to inspect, rebuild and tune them in place. If Honda walked away today, nothing would change - so your post was wrong. I know you don't like it that you were wrong and are finding any way around that, including shooting the messenger, but it doesn't make it any less wrong. If Honda walked away next year, it wouldn't change. Parts would still be available, Motorland Aragon would keep working on them and delivering fresh engines to races.



You followed up with a post professing a different viewpoint - all well and good - it doesn't change that you made a prior, incorrect, statement that I pointed out was a fallacy.



Retrospectively changing what you say may work for Mitt Romney with uninformed voters, but your post is quoted - it's what you said, and it's incorrect.

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I have run a fairly consistent line of argument in the whole thread, whether or not that argument is correct. I post frequently and probably too much, and especially in view of this don't re-explain my whole argument in each post.



I actually said "If honda won't play and they have to rely on second hand engines from honda roadbikes, or new engines from hyosung,even dorna might have trouble dressing moto2 up as an elite bike racing series, and the problem would imo be much greater if they attempted to extend the model to moto1" . There actually isn't any moto 1 at present, ezy has recently said that he is thinking of creating it based on the moto 2 model, which I had interpreted as a spec engine, and nor was I suggesting that honda would break their current contract to supply moto2 engines. My point was that dorna probably can't operate in isolation, and imo need a technological partner or partners, more so than is the case with F1 as was discussed earlier in the thread. I intended my statement to be inclusive of not being able to obtain new engines from a traditional gp racing firm such as honda, using honda as an example because they are the current incumbent, and mentioned hyosung as an example of the type of new supplier they might engage if the traditional firms won't play, with the implication that such a supplier may not have much credibility with the traditional supporter base; I will concede hyosung is not necessarily a good example as their technology is fairly advanced these days, but they are still hardly a traditional bike racing powerhouse.



Someone is running a similar line of argument about the perils of investment bankers rather than bike people running gp and wsbk bike racing on david emmett's site, which doesn't make it correct but does mean there are others who think similarly. Do you really think dorna are motivated purely by the love of close racing? Do you think they had a problem when it was rossi on a yamaha who was being crushingly dominant? I also think one of their motivations for moto 2 was that they were annoyed aprilia were making substantial money selling their 250 bikes, and similarly they were annoyed that honda and yamaha were defraying their costs by charging exorbitant amounts to supply satellite bikes, which dorna were subsidising. I personally would rather see actual bike people like aprilia make money out of the sport than dorna, not that aprilia weren't pushing things too far. Bridgepoint would seem to have already shown their hand as well, as they are putting ezy, the accountant, in charge of the whole shebang rather than the flamminis, the bike guys.





I take jumkie's point as well about capitalists buying the opposition then closing them down. It certainly happens in my field, where small operations are proud to produce drugs or other useful medical products at a profit level which they are happy with, but if they are taken over and the product isn't sufficiently profitable or doesn't have a big enough market to meet the requirements of the bean counters at the big corporation, it not infrequently leads to the discontinuation of the product.



I am all for getting gp out of what seems to be an unsustainable cost spiral and away from chasing arcane technological dead ends, and have argued myself previously that the increasing similarity of wsbk and motogp bikes is not viable/sustainable. I just don't think that investment bankers being seemingly in sole control of bike racing at the elite level is a good idea.



(EDIT very happy for the FIM to take back control as per your other post, it is what I have been arguing on here for years, and uniform rules for national championships etc is a great idea. Also see david emmett's take on this, which I have just seen, and is more balanced than mine; he shares your dislike of honda. He claims that ezy has actually said that he could go out and buy 40 honda CBR 600s from a honda dealer if honda withdraw totally ).

Andy Roo said:

Totally separate and without google

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michaelm said:

I actually said...

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Ah, sometimes you're just to nice. Well...actually always. I've made the same mistake myself, that is, repeating thinking somehow peeps will magically understand the 2nd, 3rd, 4th time.

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[font=Helvetica Neue', Arial, Verdana, sans-serif][background=rgb(255, 255, 255)]A bit of unsolicited advice: consider the source.[/background][/font]