How long will Honda wait on Pedrosa

At the end of 2009,Pedrosa will be facing contract negotiations and from the way things look right now,his prospects for 09 dont look promising.Rossi and Stoner appear head and shoulders above him,Lorenzo will only get better and us Hayden fans can only hope that Nicky gets along with the Ducati.Would a 4th or 5th place finish in the championship next year get him rehired or fired.He has proven not to be a fighter and with the distraction of having another teammate he cant stand,will Honda finally get the balls to tell Puig and Dani to take a hike.If so,where would he go,where could he go.What team would want his baggage and inability to get along with the others.This could really be a make or break year for him.

I think Honda would do well to get Puig out of there no matter what they decide with Dani.
2009 will be the 3rd year of the 800's era. An era Honda were keen to force upon us from most reports. If the Puig/Pedrosa alliance doesn't bear fruit this year, then I think Honda may make a play for someone else. Lorenzo perhaps? Simoncelli perhaps? Bautista perhaps?

I'm picking Dovi will get no help whatsoever from the other side of the garage next year and that isn't healthy to be happening year in year out when new bikes need developing. I think if Honda were to let Dani go, then Suzuki & Kawasaki would swoop, however I think having Puig come with him, creates perhaps more problems than it solves.

Pedrosa will have a seat in Motogp beyond next year. Reason being, the guy can flat out ride. How soon we forget that he disappeared and left Rossi and Stoner in the dust on a few occasions.

He is a true talent. As it stands right now there are a few that can out shine the pack And Dani is one of the main guys:

1. []Rossi[]Stoner[]Dani[]Lorenzo[]-----[]Dovi[]DeAngelis

Dovi and DeAngelis have not shown the shear outright speed that Stoner/Lorenzo/Pedrosa showed in their first season (I know they are not on factory kits but)

Lets not forget that Dani is Spanish. That alone will garner factory interest and sponsor dollars. Dani is not going to WSBK or any where else after 2009.


Oh yeah. Who will replace him at HRC. Dovi and DeAngelis? Hector Babera is coming to the GP's on a Kawasaki so he is out. HRC will not risk the future on another 250 rookie so it may be better to keep him. Again he is not going anywhere

About as long as they waited for Nicki and he managed to win them that one small championship.

Pedrosa is like a girl I once knew. All I wanted from her was ..., but she made it hard for me, “take out to dinner at that nice restaurant”…”buy me that little keepsake thingy” take me to the beach today. Paraded the goods around but didn’t hand them out. Looked like a winner but was a high maintenance under performer.

So Pedro sooked for a better engine and Nicki did the hard yards on it. Then he wanted Bridgestone’s so they supplied Shinya with a factory bike for a spot of development. A lot of work is going into him and he’s not putting out. Mr Honda is NOT riding in on the vinegar stroke of that championship victory that he has paid for (via Ezy Dorna Puig etc.) and Pedro will suffer the same fate as that girl.

And everybody knows that Pedro ..... is high maintenance now, his asking price just halved and he is solidly in satellite bike territory now. Also if the single tyre manufacturer fails, his outburst was the straw that broke the camels back. A loyal camel from 1982 to 2008 for Honda & Michelin. And there is another Spaniard now who can ride, is personable (marketable), can ride up a storm and is liked...

Just another ex 250cc champion seat filler and random number generator our boy Dani. Dani Melandri they call him.

Tip on outa here ....., times up.

Andy, I believe you win the post of the month award.

BTW, what a great analogy. Dani is a .....!

Only three of the riders on the grid are proven motogp champions and besides them Dani has by far the best form and pre-motogp record. Honda wont get rid of Dani unless they can get someone better to do his job. It rests on Dovi. If he were to leave Honda the only team who are in a position to justify not looking at him is Yamaha.

Pedrosa is extremely talented and fast, and I am sure as tom says would be of great interest to teams other than honda, although admittedly they might not be so keen on puig, particularly with the recent talk of attempts to organise boycotts etc. Dani has won 4 races in the 800cc era on what does not seem to be a great bike, although he may have contributed to this by not favouring the development of the pneumatic engined bike. He has also been on what seem to now be universally regarded as sub-standard tyres, and had a major crash this year prior to which he was quite competitive.

If honda finally do get the bike right, I would be surprised if dovi proved to be faster than dani; dovi might be keener on racing , but this does not seem on recent evidence to be a trait honda values highly.

That said , honda may be looking for scapegoats if they have another bad year. What would be really amusing at least to honda haters is if the pneumatic bike proves to be too much of a handful for either dovi or dani, and in fact requires a bigger stronger hayden type rider to show its best.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (michaelm @ Oct 8 2008, 11:03 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}><div class='quotemain'>honda may be looking for scapegoats if they have another bad year. What would be really amusing at least to honda haters is if the pneumatic bike proves to be too much of a handful for either dovi or dani, and in fact requires a bigger stronger hayden type rider to show its best.

ok, so i am a honda "hater" and yes, i would find this scenario highly amusing and also very poetic...

i somewhat doubt that the rc212v will be too much bike for pedders or dovi with the engine management systems now but it might prove too much for a spec/control tyre which is not tailor made for the rider..

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Andy Roo @ Oct 8 2008, 06:11 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}><div class='quotemain'>Pedrosa is like a girl I once knew. All I wanted from her was ..., but she made it hard for me, “take out to dinner at that nice restaurant”…”buy me that little keepsake thingy” take me to the beach today. Paraded the goods around but didn’t hand them out. Looked like a winner but was a high maintenance under performer.

Tip on outa here ....., times up.

100% sure this is the best post of the month

Here is why Puig needs to go.

Puig on Pedrosa, Hayden and Repsol Honda

........

Puig on the wall that now exists in the Honda garage because of different tyre suppliers
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE <div class='quotemain'>Dani´s Repsol Honda teammate Nicky Hayden has mentioned in various interviews that he isn´t keen on the divide. Was there previously any kind of collaboration that no longer exists?

`All I can say is that Hayden may be bothered because now he can´t access information and telemetry data from Dani´s bike. With this information he was able to improve his riding, as he had all of Dani´s references and now he can´t use that any longer. He was simply copying as he never knew how to set-up a bike. A professional rider can´t be complaining because he can´t get access to the other rider´s data, because finding what works best is his job, not the other rider´s. Everybody knows that a racing team doesn´t work like a football team. It involves two riders, but each is working for himself and the factory will support the rider who has the best chance. Because when it comes to winning, only one rider wins. It has always been like this and it always will be like this - anybody who says the opposite is just lying to look good.´


Isn't it strange that he says Nicky can't setup the bike without Dani's data, yet Nicky's results have improved a lot since that wall went up. I trust Puig about as far as I can throw him.


Sorry for hijacking the thread Povol but I believe this post is relevant to the topic.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Frizzle @ Oct 8 2008, 06:26 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}><div class='quotemain'>Isn't it strange that he says Nicky can't setup the bike without Dani's data, yet Nicky's results have improved a lot since that wall went up.
Can't say the same about Dani's.

pedrosa has pushed himself into a corner now and there is only one way out. win races and win big.
otherwise IMO hes out at the end of 2009. for all the embarrassment that he has caused honda, he will have to back it up and do it next year or he will be riding for another team(probably not a honda team either)

I've give Pedrosa one more year on the factory Honda, because he's not going to win it next year either.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (mjpartyboy @ Oct 8 2008, 12:40 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}><div class='quotemain'>I've give Pedrosa one more year on the factory Honda, because he's not going to win it next year either.
Honda could still come up with an unbeatable bike, at least engine-wise; they have been known to do this in the past. As others have said though, someone has to develop it for racing even if they get the engineering right; I would have kept nakano at gresini on a factory spec bike if I were them.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Frizzle @ Oct 8 2008, 07:26 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}><div class='quotemain'>Here is why Puig needs to go.

Puig on Pedrosa, Hayden and Repsol Honda

........

Puig on the wall that now exists in the Honda garage because of different tyre suppliers



Isn't it strange that he says Nicky can't setup the bike without Dani's data, yet Nicky's results have improved a lot since that wall went up. I trust Puig about as far as I can throw him.


Sorry for hijacking the thread Povol but I believe this post is relevant to the topic.

This quote says it all

Are you doing a better job with the garage partition in place?
`I wouldn´t say that. We work the same way as always.


What he is saying is there was a wall before there was a wall and everyone new it.Puig is full of .... when he says Nicky wants Dani's set up data.The riding styles are night and day different and ones setup would mean nothing to the other.The reason Nicky doesnt like the wall is more of a personal thing,to him,it was just another sign of how unappreciated he was.I think the main reason for Nicky's resurgence is he has taken a .... YOU,I will show you mentality towards Honda,Pedrosa and Puig.That and I firmly believe since Pedrosa switched,he is getting Michelins "A" tire.

I don't understand some peoples point of view here.
I've had to read for the last 10 months how the new Honda has been built 'for' Dani.
Now we have Puig saying that Nicky can't set the bike up and I read that Puig is some sort of objectionable character for saying this.
My question is this; how is Nicky supposed to set up a bike built for someone else?
Obviously he can't!

He shouldn´t involve Dani´s manager in this just because he´s jealous of another rider.´

hahaha whos won the world championship!?,god i hope nicky keeps beating dani this season and then next year aswell


edit: whoops wrong topic

My opinion of Pedrosa is always going back and forth.

After Estoril 2006 I really hoped he would have a career ending injury.

After Germany 2007 when Puig said "when Dani ride the bike, he can do" I felt sorry for him. Honda built a whopping piece of junk called the RC212V and it was shod with 2nd class tires. Nobody could win on that thing without help from the weather or a perfect setup.

I'm glad Honda's chickens are coming home to roost. They set off on their stupid mass centralization crusade. Everything on the bike is built for the purpose of smashing all of the mass directly into the center of the bike. The obvious result is that a normal sized human being can't do jack with it.

The RC212V isn't good at anything. The only advantage it has is the ability to launch you 5 grid slots forward when the lights go out. If you don't clear off, you get mugged b/c it doesn't even have 1 strength a rider can rely on to defend his line or retake a lost position. The RC212 is well above average on an empty track, as soon as you have to race people, it's useless.

Contrast that with other design philosophies. Yamahas are demons on the brakes and they turn superbly. Ducati is all about raw power and electronic innovation. Both of those manufacturers win easily when they set up the bike to play to its strengths.

You can't do that on a Honda. So they lose everywhere. I'm not sure Dovi is the answer to Honda's troubles either. Even though he can move through the field like a hot knife through butter, he ends up getting mugged just like Pedrosa.

Dani shouldn't give Honda the pleasure of firing him. He should walk.

Dani Pedrosa has as much fight in him as the French's do, that is why i don't rate him so highly. He is only fast when the bike is setup perfectly, other than that he can't ride around the bike if his life depended on it. Seriously, I have yet to see Dani pull off a pass this season, except for when the lights goes out on the starting grid... and that is only due to his jockey size advantage. Dani is no way rated #3 rider, imo. Here is my top 5 list.

1) Valentino Rossi - no question here.

2) Andrea Dovizioso - this guy is the one to take it to Rossi, just watch kids.

3) Jorge Lorenzo - hasn't shown his hand yet, loads of potential yet to be seen.

4) Casey Stoner - very fast rider, but is he strong enough mentally to make a come back?

5) Dani Pedrosa - fast rider only on a fast bike, can't ride in the wet or ride around a bike.

Before you start spewing out numbers to me.... this is just how i rate them as a rider, not on how many wins or championships they've had so far in their career.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (SuperShinya56 @ Oct 8 2008, 02:09 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}><div class='quotemain'>Dani Pedrosa has as much fight in him as the French's do, that is why i don't rate him so highly. He is only fast when the bike is setup perfectly, other than that he can't ride around the bike if his life depended on it. Seriously, I have yet to see Dani pull off a pass this season, except for when the lights goes out on the starting grid... and that is only due to his jockey size advantage. Dani is no way rated #3 rider, imo. Here is my top 5 list.

1) Valentino Rossi - no question here.

2) Andrea Dovizioso - this guy is the one to take it to Rossi, just watch kids.

3) Jorge Lorenzo - hasn't shown his hand yet, loads of potential yet to be seen.

4) Casey Stoner - very fast rider, but is he strong enough mentally to make a come back?

5) Dani Pedrosa - fast rider only on a fast bike, can't ride in the wet or ride around a bike.

Before you start spewing out numbers to me.... this is just how i rate them as a rider, not on how many wins or championships they've had so far in their career.

The only one i disagree with is Stoner.I would swap the 2 and 4.He has gotten beat this year by the best that ever lived and is running a Dominant second,that is hardly mentally broke.I wish i was so mentally weak as to win 5-6 races in an off year.