Thanks once again kropo for taking the time to chat with us, your inside info, insight and contributions are very welcome on our little forum.
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Thanks once again kropo for taking the time to chat with us, your inside info, insight and contributions are very welcome on our little forum.
The Repsol bikes did use Showa until the Bridgestone switch. Dovi was the first factory rider to ask for Ohlins, after that, the entire team switched. It was easier than developing the Showa kit to handle the Bridgestone tires, and Honda were under serious pressure to win.
They own 3 times more shares than the next largest shareholder. Honda want to build the Showa brand, but they will not jeopardize the competitiveness of HRC. The satellite teams are probably happy to do some development work, and get some funding support.
You can already see a storm cloud on the horizon, right? At some point, Honda will probably try to switch HRC back to Showa, though the company allegedly no longer has direct control. I have a feeling it's going to get ugly, especially if Stoner isn't keen on the Showa kit.
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As for SBK, people are constantly complaining, like how can Biaggi run off track then run straight through the entire field up to second place without burning up his tires while the others are all slip sliding around. Then there was the motogp Indy race in 2011, same thing, actually people suggested BS gave Honda perfect tires and wanted the local hero NH to get crappy ones? Must have been great for BS sales in the States.
Gotta say, this is one of the best conversations I have seen on here for a long time.....
Krop, even tho most on here also read your site, its really good that you share you knowledge here as well, and it is greatly appreciated.
Krop, even tho most on here also read your site, its really good that you share you knowledge here as well, and it is greatly appreciated.
Pirelli works well in WSBK because the tires are crappy, soft construction and go off fast. Bridgestone are very conservative, and made sure tires last the distance.
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^^^... Putm all on Dunlops I say.. Bstones dont act like real tyres..
Moto2 is all Dunys isnt it?
Moto2 is all Dunys isnt it?
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Thanks. Btw, have you seen the "Inside the Outdoors"? Its good man, JohnK turned me on to it. Shows the real human side of these guys, partly talks about the struggles that they all go through and it makes you realize these guys are all just out there to get on with it, almost made me like Reed.
http://www.powerslide.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=14913&pid=309179&st=0&#entry309179
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Great points Lex.
I dont subscribe to this "alien" moniker, and certainly dont buy that they are superior to the last crop of top riders. The 990s package & tire demanded and allowed a different way of racing. Tire conservation was part of race management where as today, its the wick that plays a significant role. What happens to lap times when the computer begins to take over to manage fuel? Am i to believe certain riders on 800s cannot sustain the metronomic lap pace or are certain riders more subject to fuel conservation which erroneously may be interpreted as unexplained fade? Uhm, i wonder if this has ever been looked at with any insight and detail...(perhaps u may remember what im referring to)? Not to mention the lesson about tires we learned from Estoril Elias 06 and subsequent KRjr's input about what is what. The 800s race is won and lost during qual. Perhaps a lesson overlooked in the race strategy employed in one Laguna 08?
Back in topic, ive read countless pundits and spectators, hell even rider, talk about how more exciting the racing was when the bikes looked lose and race strategies were employed which frankly 'allowed fir racing'. I dont buy that its going "backwards" if its ... backward rules that got us here. Is that progress? To implement a set of rules that dictate uninspiring races? Dies this type of racing dictated by arbitrary rules attract interest? Sure, us diehards can watch Stoner in super-slow motion and marvel as we push the replay button to watch over and over, but what inspires the general masses to racing? I submit its the type that we get when riders are dicing and bikes are stunningly controlled by the will of their riders not so much the will of an electronic advancement dictated by arbitrary rules (like fuel efficiency).
I best say this preemptively, as saying uninspiring races may be erroneously perceived as an attack on the current champ. Let the record show, i think he'd be winning on a bike which allowed more rider control and tires that allowed for race strategy as much as he wins now. Again, let the record show, i think im the only one who has ever claimed that 'if' there are actually "aliens" in GP, Stoner is the only one. So please, no comments rebutting that im only saying the racing is uninspiring because my ulterior motive is that i dont approve of him wining. But rather, in keeping with the topic of this fine thread, that perhaps the promoters can work toward producing a formula that encompasses the characteristics of exciting racing. I am aware that there will be a minority that perceive it going backwards. But i submit the recent rules took us backwards in terms of racing. Obviously tires dictate much of the quality we witness on the track. Last years Bridgestones needed to be corrected (which is proof that new doesnt mean better because now they are improving the tire).
To cap this point, a question for Lex (or Kropo, or anybody else for that matter) are we to believe that Perrelli cannot engineer a tire to last the race distance in Wsbk? If they can, then is the product they provide now part of the attempt to provide interesting racing? Or does it serve some other purpose? Can we say the tires are "crappy" or simply designed to do what they do for the series purposes?
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If Ben Spies consistently out qualified Lorenzo, because he had the fuel available, and sped off into the lead of the race only for Lorenzo to run him down every time, then I would be thinking yeah, something is slowing him down, it could be fuel. Its not that way. Cant be a coincidence the fastest in qualifying and practice just happens to be the most fuel efficient every time?
Put the argument this way. How many race wins and w/c would I give Stoner after 5 years on a LCR Honda? Best I would say is a couple of wins, no w/c. There's the big problem. Why is that?
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Yes. The order they qual is generally the order they finish the race or near this order. The fuel management is engaged the moment the lights go out. That is, theyre locked in. My point is, this is the racing we are subjected to, is this inspiring, is this progress? My second point is, certainly, fuel management plays a role, thoough generally it is out of the control of the rider, where as tire management use to be more under the control of the rider, now its a function of current tire development where tires last the distance and power delivery, again, something out of the control of the riders. There is nothing left to make up after qual. The race is the qual.
About your second point. Yes, parity, its a problem. Just thank God Stoner was 3rd in line to go to Duc in 07.
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I was at that race. I was standing right in line with where they tip into turn 1. It was amazing seeing Rossi turn it up and go hard to get back the ten seconds. It was also sickening seeing Baylis lie there motionless at the hairpin.
Krop in response to the last few posts by Lex and Jum. Do you know how many laps they can run at full pace until the fuel computer kicks in and starts cutting power? A supplementary question: is the fuel computer retarding their pace from lap 1. One more question: If your answer to first question is they only need to save fuel for 3-5 laps due to the advancement in technology since the fuel reg started are you aware of any of the riders manually switching to fuel save mode whilst they are running behind another rider. Eg. Last season we uncharacteristically saw Stoner cruise around for the first 4-5 laps holding his place in the que before starting to move forward. Was he potential saving fuel consciously as well as waiting for tyres etc to get to temp.?
Great posts and ideas all over this thread.
One idea that stood out as outside the box and brilliant is Jumkie's reality TV thing.
Maybe I'm wrong on this but I seem to remember UFC slowly but surely gaining ground for years in popularity and then they made the deal with Spike TV and at the same time started the reality show The Ultimate Fighter showing young up and comers and guys who never got thier chance. The popularity of the sport exploded. Overnight it seemed. And I think the parallels make sense here.
MMA is a sport that on paper sounds like it would be exciting to everbody at first glance, then you watch a few matches and it turns out it's not, there are a lot of nuances that take time to appreceate. I think GP is the same way. Motorcycle racing on paper sounds like an easy sell but if you watch a random race from last season it may look kinda boring to the guy on the street. But if the guy on the street watched a program following Casey around for a while he may watch the same race that looked boring before and notice all the little things going on that make this sort amazing. " Hey look at how those wheels aren't in line as he goes around that corner", "his lap times are falling a bit, are his tires going off?". It may bring some understanding to this sport. And the personalites would make it easy. Follow Cal around for a season, that would be a great show. There is a ton of human intrest there.
I hope this post made sense, I'm quitting somking right now, a little loopy...
One idea that stood out as outside the box and brilliant is Jumkie's reality TV thing.
Maybe I'm wrong on this but I seem to remember UFC slowly but surely gaining ground for years in popularity and then they made the deal with Spike TV and at the same time started the reality show The Ultimate Fighter showing young up and comers and guys who never got thier chance. The popularity of the sport exploded. Overnight it seemed. And I think the parallels make sense here.
MMA is a sport that on paper sounds like it would be exciting to everbody at first glance, then you watch a few matches and it turns out it's not, there are a lot of nuances that take time to appreceate. I think GP is the same way. Motorcycle racing on paper sounds like an easy sell but if you watch a random race from last season it may look kinda boring to the guy on the street. But if the guy on the street watched a program following Casey around for a while he may watch the same race that looked boring before and notice all the little things going on that make this sort amazing. " Hey look at how those wheels aren't in line as he goes around that corner", "his lap times are falling a bit, are his tires going off?". It may bring some understanding to this sport. And the personalites would make it easy. Follow Cal around for a season, that would be a great show. There is a ton of human intrest there.
I hope this post made sense, I'm quitting somking right now, a little loopy...
The tires last the distance. But to answer your question, look at F1. Out with the Bridgestones (boring races) in with the Pirellis (interesting races). Pirelli were asked to build tires that went off quickly, and they did.
I don't consider it to be backwards, but I think looking to the past is a precarious strategy. Since the natural state of racing is not close, at least not with the current regulatory model, MotoGP could ban dozens of technologies without improving anything.
Personally, I think expanding MotoGP is easy with many possibilities for compromise. That's why I'm becoming so disenchanted. It's like the GPC have an acre of prime farmland. What do they grow? Prairie grass. Because? They claim they run errands for the board of directors, but I suspect they simply don't "have it". The GPC have too many irrational cognitive biases. They claim they need "fair" rules, for one. The current rules are not fair. They are arbitrary, and they reflect what the big manufacturers can force through. But since the rules must be fair, the MSMA appear poised to go through the tech sheet and start making line-item vetoes until costs have been cut. Nothing says racing like a poor man's attempt at Six Sigma.
The technical regulations are not meant to be fundamental human rights. The regs merely need to be a good faith effort to equitably meet the wants of the GPC and all consumers (businesses and fans). The MSMA have already discussed success ballasting. Now they are mulling some sort of CRT handicapping. I don't like either of those ideas, but the MSMA are headed down the right track. The current competition is not sustainable. If manufacturers loosen the purse strings, they put their competitors out of business, and the sport collapses (no return on investment for anyone). If the manufacturers don't loosen the purse strings, they get left behind, and they must withdraw in shame. A perverse competitive model that forces manufacturers to spend as much as they can afford (regardless of the economic benefit) is never going to work. The situation has been getting steadily worse since MotoGP became fuel limited.
It's six years down the road, and the GPC can barely identify the problem. The older I get, the more I realize that these people are not respectable racing executives, but lost boys living in a Neverland of their own creation. They are determined never to grow up.
Bike never runs at "full pace". ECU manages and revises fuel strategy lap by lap. As I understand it, the rider can choose a different mapping if they want to achieve something specific, but they know that could affect the race further along. But 99% of the time, riders have no awareness of what is going on. Fuel strategies have got better and better, and they rarely notice it any more.
Obviously the msma can't be allowed to set the technical regs, the natural end point of that is some abstruse engineering competition pretty much like the 800 motogp formula.
A very smart australian guy , both a billionaire and a sportsnut who made fairly extensive (and expensive) personal research into the matter in regard to cricket, came to the conclusion that media organisations should not run sports and I think both that he is correct and that this is true of dorna, even though it is not really any fault of dorna's they have ended up in the position of doing so as you have said; if anything they have probably tried too hard to be fair and have been too accommodating to the msma.
A body like FIM, or like FIM should be, imo should be in charge of the tech regs, and sell the media rights periodically, and if their product is no good and they attract less for media rights they can deal with it, whilst also hopefully having more concern for the development of the sport, nourishing of the grass roots, etc than venture capitalists. I don't necessarily have anything against venture capitalists in my old age, I just don't think they can or should run authentic sports.
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That's interesting (I suspected as much). Kropo, speaking of tires, I can't remember off-hand where I read it, but I remember Stoner mentioned that tires last year heated up a bit inconsistent at the beginning, as I remember his description of the anomaly went something like, the tire felt initially good then oddly losing heat, then later regaining the heat. Do you know if other riders reported such inconsistency? Other than Stoner's description, I only recall riders mention that there were early lap heating issues, but not quite saying they lost heat then regained it (or maybe I wasn’t paying attention and misinterpreted it only to mean the tires took longer to heat up linearly.)
My question is, was this considered a tire glitch or something more akin to unique rider operation? In other words, was Stoner experiencing this because of the unique way he rides at the beginning of a session or a race (unique in that he always seems to post a flyer lap very early while others wait a bit into a session). So perhaps only he would detect a loss of heat (or describe it as such) since he was already pushing the limits of lap times early on (except this wouldn’t necessarily hold true in a race as others would be pushing close to the limit would be my guess, except Spies). As to the correction of this problem (assuming it was a ‘glitch’ as oppose to unique rider operation) since others reported simply ‘early heat issues’, are the two tire batches (codes 21/24) both designed to address this problem? Or are they simply the next evolution of tire designed for the new formula? Or a combination of both?
Reason why I’m asking is because I found it interesting that it was reported (by you in a tweet) that Stoner was unique in preferring one particular code while the rest preferred the other. I’m not sure where you chime in on the ‘tire conspiracy’ though in your tweet you used the word “conspiracy” (perhaps witty/tongue in cheek). But I’m just wondering what’s your opinion on the idea that Stoner might be the victim of tire shenanigans (conspiracy) or perhaps just as simple as differing tire preference as would be expected on a tire that is developed to encompass the CRTs as well as the “prototype” entries? It would seem a waste of time, in that nothing has really proven to slow Stoner down with any degree of effectiveness, assuming that was their aim (conspiracy). But again, perhaps the “conspiracy” would be to ‘help’ Rossi/Ducati. Tires being so important, it would seem the natural focus to effect the series either way, if somebody was so inclined. Or are they simply trying to unlock the right combination that will allow for more interesting racing, as you mentioned above regarding the design of Pirelli. I would believe either, as I don’t doubt for a minute the series politic is beneath or above such shenanigans.
Some sort of disinterested, incorruptible, governing authority is definitely the best option. The FIA have their problems, but they have managed to hang on to F1 for all these years.
Media company ownership is a conundrum. The companies are essentially creative product designers who don't really understand the concept of spontaneous competition. Why would they let the sport evolve naturally if they can create something much better? Even public governance is asking similar questions (to the detriment of mankind, imo). However, despite the shortcomings of media institutions, why shouldn't they be allowed to own an product that earns all of its revenue from viewership and advertising? Furthermore, cricket teams play to earn profits, but MSMA members do not. At a glance, the MSMA appear to be following the intent of sport (competition not profit), but a more thorough examination reveals that the MSMA actually use MotoGP for advertising, which removes them from sport even more than the profit motives of modern sports franchise owners.
Ultimately, I think commercial ownership is decided on pragmatic grounds. Perhaps they have no business owning the sport, but the sport ends up in their possession b/c they are the least bad of the options. I'd like to think that the situation can be remedied by potent governing bodies, but I really don't know the politics of these institutions. Maybe the FIM is the most inept of them all. If that's the case, the sport would be in better stead if Dorna spun off their consultants into some kind of independent committee, funded by the GPC, to stop the sport from collapsing on itself.
Tires: Remember Rossi's crash? That was the same thing. Put them in the tire warmers and the rubber would get hot, but it wouldn't stick. Go out on the first lap and push to heat it up, but if you slack off for a while on lap 2, the tire cools sufficiently for you to get slung into low earth orbit.
As for Stoner's preference, he has not had problems getting heat into the front tires, so he likes the stiffer compound. Other riders are less keen, as they do find it hard. But the problem is also a little about the Honda, both Stoner and Pedrosa preferred the 24 over the 21 (the codes Bridgestone use - and before you ask, they're meaningless apart from being an ID code), while the rest of the riders preferred the 21. The Honda seems to be able to cope with the stiffer front tire better.
As for Stoner's preference, he has not had problems getting heat into the front tires, so he likes the stiffer compound. Other riders are less keen, as they do find it hard. But the problem is also a little about the Honda, both Stoner and Pedrosa preferred the 24 over the 21 (the codes Bridgestone use - and before you ask, they're meaningless apart from being an ID code), while the rest of the riders preferred the 21. The Honda seems to be able to cope with the stiffer front tire better.
