"If you aren't going to give 100%, don't bother turning up"

#22 said:

From crash.net.





Maybe if Yamaha gave Ben a bike that didn't chatter off the track, break in half and ....... blow up he might do better!











Ben Spies, who announced via the internet that he was leaving Yamaha on the eve of last month's US MotoGP, has revealed behind-the-scenes tension with a senior member of the company.



After being forced out of second place by a massive engine failure in Sunday's Indianapolis Grand Prix - the latest in a relentless run of race day mishaps and bad luck - Spies was asked about his level of frustration.



Whilst reflecting on the setbacks he has suffered in 2012, Spies claimed that he was told 'not to show up' for the US GP if he wasn't going to ride at a hundred percent.



"There's frustration, but it's kind of almost got to a laughing point for me,” Spies began. “I'm really not even upset about it. It's just been so many things, one after another. You don't know how to respond to it.



"At Mugello, we had food poisoning, and that was a bad experience. I tried everything I could to do what we could, but it was a bad result.



"I was told by somebody at Yamaha that if I'm not going to ride a hundred percent at Laguna [Seca], don't show up.



"I came to Laguna, and I tried the best I could. The bike had a malfunction. Then we came here with a hundred percent and did the best we could, and we had another mechanical with the bike. I've given my hundred percent.



"So to be told what I was told after Mugello and the way it was, and then to give the effort I've given the last two weekends, I just don't think it's been too fair."



Spies, who was racing with a shoulder injury after falling in qualifying, refused to identify the person who had made the comment: "I'm not going to say any names, but yeah, it was somebody high up."



When asked if he felt Yamaha was not giving him a hundred percent, Spies added:



"No, I wouldn't say that. I know my team is, my crew. It's shown. The bike's been good the last two weekends. I just don't respect what was told to me and what we've tried to do this year.



“We had our problem at Assen with the tyre, which was not Yamaha's fault, and also at Silverstone. But at Qatar and here and Laguna, we've had three [color=blue !important][font=verdana, arial][color=blue !important][font=verdana, arial][background=transparent]mechanical[/background][/font][/font][/color][/color] problems with the bike. I wouldn't say it's Yamaha's fault at all. It's just been bad luck, too.



“Why it's happening to me, I don't know. There was a big frustration level, I'd say, about a month ago. But now it's just... we go to Brno, and I just kind of wonder what's going to happen next."



Spies, who is just tenth in the championship with a best finish of fourth this year, will be replaced by Valentino Rossi next season. The former [color=blue !important][font=verdana, arial][color=blue !important][font=verdana, arial]World [/font][color=blue !important][font=verdana, arial]Superbike[/font][/color][/font][/color][/color] champion, with Yamaha, is yet to announce his 2013 plans.



Team-mate Jorge Lorenzo leads the championship and finished second at Indianapolis after Spies' smokey exit.

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He should tell his employers that the package he has is only good for seventh place at best and ride at 50% - that way Dorna will swiftly transfer him to a more favourable ride.

It was a good idea by Yamaha to swap one of Lorenzo's old engines into Spies bike. Lorenzo needed a fresh one after Assen, and Spies obviously wasnt expected to turn up.

.... if I was Yammi and Ben announced he was leaving the company on the eve of his greatest marketing workload of the season I'd question if his motivation was 100% as well. Not really a story, but a perfect crash.net fluff piece. BTW, Barry, do you use a fluffer?

Ben needs to go to a team that wants him and realizes he is the future. Rossi is no longer the future of the sport rather a hopeful band-aid until someone else comes in to take his crown. It surely isn't Jorge, and I would bet he is hoping that happens to some degree with Rossi coming back to the team and be the second fiddle. Hopefully we haven't seen the last of Mr. Spies, hint hint, Suzuki.

"don't bother to show up" damn that's gotta be a bit of a slap in the face. From where I'm sitting I see Ben put up lap times in practices and qualifying but come sunday it all falls apart. Obviously whoever said it has a better perspective than I do . He has had about As worst a string of bad luck as I've ever seen. Tires, frames, engine? . Gotta be frustrating losing to the sat bikes . I liked the comment about one of Jorge's old used engines. Didn't think of it but it seems like a possibility as we all know lor is low on engines. According the RR world's issue that I just recieved stoner was only on eng #2 at mugello!! This engine limit could cause issue near the end.

Mick D said:

.... if I was Yammi and Ben announced he was leaving the company on the eve of his greatest marketing workload of the season I'd question if his motivation was 100% as well. Not really a story, but a perfect crash.net fluff piece. BTW, Barry, do you use a fluffer?

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He says that he was told after Mugello, rather than after the announcement. He was, after all, already at Laguna when he made the announcement, so too late for "don't show up".



I'd bet my bottom dollar it was Jarvis who said that to him.



BTW, not originating with crash.net as all they do is cut&paste anyway, but an IMS interview apparently.

I was absolutely gutted for ben yesterday, it must be hard for him to give 100% when everything breaks. I like how he said in the interview that he almost didnt even care anymore and he is just waiting for the next bad thing to happen at brno

Whiner!

ROCKGOD01 said:

Ben needs to go to a team that wants him and realizes he is the future.

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I don't know that there are any CRT rides going spare...

........ Anyone else noticed that the only person to have no bad luck this season is the person who usually does ?



Put two and two together and you come up with Pedrosa and a voodoo doll collection.







I gotta funny feeling Pedrosa's going to finally do it..............



As for Spies, hope he hooks up with Suzuki's next MotoGP effort.

Stoner is current king of moaners with his comments towards Rossi ... yeah, like Rossi has an engineering degree and can build a bike chassis, or lay fiber, or build eletronic control systems, or work the bearing gap in Rods, or set piston ring gap, or and the million other things that one needs to know to make a complete mechanical package the best it can be -- if you want stupid statements, Stoner is the king of them.



Anyway, back to Ben Spies. For a senior Yamaha ranked employee to make statements about "don't show up if you don't give 100%" is even more stupid than Stoner's statements -- that's a very professional way to motivate a team and grow Yamaha's revenue. The higher higher ups should release whomever said this as it's not professional and certainly isn't good for business.



If I were Ben, I'd say I'm NOT coming to the next event until YOU understand and communicate to me why I've had all these issues with my bike (engine failure, collapsed shock, cracked frame, tires, etc.) -- obviously the failures or explanations of the failures were NOT communicated to Ben. Someone "missed" a cracked frame?? This is MotoGP right, not club racing? It's the old "Bad batch" story.



I think what really happened here is that someone at Yamaha decided they wanted Rossi back ... but not only that, they didn't want Ben to be a threat to them (at another team) either. Yamaha don't have infinite funds (they funding is not as big as Honda's) ... so yeah, Ben got marginal equipment to save money to afford TWO championship winners on one team for 2012.



Can't really call it "intentional" or a "conspiracy" as I doubt someone "sabotaged" Ben's equipment -- it's really just a matter of not being as thorough and not spending as much money as they do with Lorenzo.



Anyway Ben, goto SBK for a year and come back to MotoGP on a Suzuki and lets watch Suzuki sales in the US skyrocket

Zootalaws said:

I don't know that there are any CRT rides going spare...

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CRT's are ..... I am talking about Suzuki coming back in 2014 with that crossplane crank powered bike. I hope he goes back to SBK anyway, Hayden and Edwards to. GP is just a snorfest anyway. It isn't really exciting. I watch all the practice and qualifying as well, and that seems to have more excitement than the races. Look, Dorna is ........, Spain is ........, Carmen Ezpeleta is .....yeah you guessed it, a steaming pile all his own. Especially since he musta had something to do with Vale going back to Yamaha. How else did he know he was going back to a "competitive" bike? Stoner is leaving before he needs to...I mean something is happening with GP that is garbage. And I have a feeling it is all due to Dorna.

Oh and for Pedrosa, he breaks something next week. Yes, Curve has a Crystal ball, he just didn't want to say it out loud.

#22 said:

Stoner doesn't have an engineering degree either, but he still won races on the Ducati

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He also didn't improve the Ducati in his time there. I'm happy not to blame Stoner providing others don't blame Rossi.

#22 said:

Stoner doesn't have an engineering degree either, but he still won races on the Ducati

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Shinya Nakano had an engineering degree and he didn't win much in motogp, but i'm positive he wasn't designing his own bike.



When Stoner had issues with Ducati there were a lot of people keen to point out that Stoner 'couldn't develop a bike', Rossi seemed to agree and gave it a go, obviously not realising what he was getting himself in for. Now it is the other side of the motogp fanbase division keen to point out that Rossi isn't the development legend he's supposed to be. I think both sets are way off, it isn't their job to do that.