I'm once again shocked.
MotoGP schedule making is a f***ing joke.
MotoGP schedule making is a f***ing joke.
Kazakhstan cancelled (again)
- Thread starter JFM01
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Not surprising, whatever the problems are, there was no guarantee that a delay was gong to fix them
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This is something that I expect Liberty to fix, these remote locations just do not work for anyone involved in the sport. I get the thinking "If you build it they will come" however hosting a major racing series involves more then just building a track, it requires a host city and infrastructure all working together to make the race happen and investments at all levels.
Kazakhstan is another hotbed of intelligence meddling and neo-cold-war. The country just lived through a failed coup attempt 2 years ago.
No telling what's going on. It could be an innocent attempt by MotoGP to capitalize on a country that wants to raise it's profile on the global stage. It could be some sort of economic beachhead established by the West and tied into foreign aid to Kazakhstan to influence politics and economic activity in the region. Maybe Dorna and company are failing. Maybe Kazakhstan is playing Dorna for fools. Maybe Russia is causing problems.
There is no way to determine exactly what is happening, but I'm glad MotoGP riders will not be traveling to Kazakhstan.
No telling what's going on. It could be an innocent attempt by MotoGP to capitalize on a country that wants to raise it's profile on the global stage. It could be some sort of economic beachhead established by the West and tied into foreign aid to Kazakhstan to influence politics and economic activity in the region. Maybe Dorna and company are failing. Maybe Kazakhstan is playing Dorna for fools. Maybe Russia is causing problems.
There is no way to determine exactly what is happening, but I'm glad MotoGP riders will not be traveling to Kazakhstan.
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Read a great book about it a few years back. "Apples are from Kazakhstan; The land that disappeared". Untold oil wealth, with a government unequal to the task of creating meaningful social programs and infrastructure, with $ being poured into palaces, discos and Maseratis. I picture MotoGp teams standing on lines at Quicky-Marts buying bottled water and goat kebabs.
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Possibly they'll fix it. In other words don't commit to these venues.
KAZ is a back door to the Russian marked. Not saying Dorna would like to have a workaround....
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When COTA first opened they had a little q/a with people from the track (Keven Shwartz was part of the panel) and they went over what it took to get the race, and I do remember getting on the schedule was the easy part, just a matter of paying a sanctioning fee, even is the venue is not ready. The venue then has to meet certain standards by certain dates. The venue does all the work, MotoGP just has to show up.
The sticking point for many international motorsport events is the sanctioning fee. The organizers argue that the event brings substantial tax revenue to the area and that some taxing authority should be responsible for at least part of the sanctioning fee. In Texas, the $25M sanctioning fee is paid by the state special event fund, though Austin may have been subsidizing the event indirectly as well.
Public subsidies for sanctioning fees is important concept because it introduces geopolitics to sport, and that's part of the reason I often highlight the European takeover of MotoGP. Europe is the heart of MotoGP, and it still hosts over half of the calendar. Are European governments content to pay escalating sanctioning fees with public money to fund a sport that highlights Japanese motorcycles? Spain, maybe, since their main concern is keeping Dorna at the helm, but for the rest of Europe, as their monetary investment in the sport has grown, they have begun playing hardball.
People talk about cyclical changes in motorsport, but that's probably not what's occurring. The introduction of ride height looks more like a coordinated strategy that was meant to level the playing field, but the system is more powerful than many in the GPC realized. The Japanese have been humiliated on the track. Suzuki withdrew, and I suspect they are completely disenchanted with international motorsport, regardless of their face-saving press releases about corporate strategy and profit.
The more manufacturers the better, but if the GPC hope to balance the needs of global manufacturers, they will need more sophisticated arrangement regarding technical regulations. Accidentally dunking on the Japanese is not the sign of competent leadership. Top Japanese bike is 14th in the championship right now. Three years ago, Yamaha and Quartararo won the riders title.
Ride height has been a disaster. Good thing we won't be watching the bikes lower themselves in Kazakhstan
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The sticking point for many international motorsport events is the sanctioning fee. The organizers argue that the event brings substantial tax revenue to the area and that some taxing authority should be responsible for at least part of the sanctioning fee. In Texas, the $25M sanctioning fee is paid by the state special event fund, though Austin may have been subsidizing the event indirectly as well.
Public subsidies for sanctioning fees is important concept because it introduces geopolitics to sport, and that's part of the reason I often highlight the European takeover of MotoGP. Europe is the heart of MotoGP, and it still hosts over half of the calendar. Are European governments content to pay escalating sanctioning fees with public money to fund a sport that highlights Japanese motorcycles? Spain, maybe, since their main concern is keeping Dorna at the helm, but for the rest of Europe, as their monetary investment in the sport has grown, they have begun playing hardball.
People talk about cyclical changes in motorsport, but that's probably not what's occurring. The introduction of ride height looks more like a coordinated strategy that was meant to level the playing field, but the system is more powerful than many in the GPC realized. The Japanese have been humiliated on the track. Suzuki withdrew, and I suspect they are completely disenchanted with international motorsport, regardless of their face-saving press releases about corporate strategy and profit.
The more manufacturers the better, but if the GPC hope to balance the needs of global manufacturers, they will need more sophisticated arrangement regarding technical regulations. Accidentally dunking on the Japanese is not the sign of competent leadership. Top Japanese bike is 14th in the championship right now. Three years ago, Yamaha and Quartararo won the riders title.
Ride height has been a disaster. Good thing we won't be watching the bikes lower themselves in Kazakhstan
Great post.
The ride height saga has been a disaster. It would have been banned in F1 immediately because it constitutes moveable aero. It's like MotoGP's version of active aero dynamics in F1 that was quickly banned 30 years ago because it took driver ability out of the picture when the car would just setup for the optimal heights and pitches for each corner.
Screwing the Japanese over was not a wise decision in my opinion, and frankly I hope they are throwing the kitchen sink at the 850cc era by this point as I would like nothing more than to see the Honda RC214V be a monster in 2 years time at Losail.
I'm more of the belief that if a rider of MM's caliber had to go to Ducati just to have a snowball's chance in hell of being competitive, the current arrangement is not only flawed, but entirely .......
As long as the competition is not obviously skewed one way or another, I'll be content. This mishap with ride height was probably not a work of malice. In 2019, Marquez had one of his most dominant seasons, and he renewed his deal with Honda for another 4 years. The GPC were probably assuming that he'd win another 2-3 titles BEFORE his 30th birthday, and they were looking for a way to add some intrigue to the sport.
No one could have predicted that Marc would miss the entire 2020 season, and then struggle to regain his form. No one predicted COVID and the havoc it wreaked on supply chains. Opening Pandora's box looked like a good option compared to another 2-3 runaway victories for Marquez. Unfortunately, the GPC got it all wrong. Hopefully, the 850s will move things in the correct direction.
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No I don't feel it was a work of malice when the ride height devices were brought in as don't believe anything in the FIM Technical Regulations ever even spoke to such a thing due to it not seeming to be a feasible avenue for GP racing. I think I was looking through the Regulations somewhere around maybe 2017 trying to find out if there was some way of banning the winglets on the bike because I was already concerned about that well before we ever even got close to things like ground effects fairings. But I think where the FIM dropped the ball was not having anything pertaining to "moveable aerodynamics". The F1 rule is pretty straightforward, and yes the teams to try to cheat it with flexy front wings and the like leading to further tests being established to check for violations. It helps having it just to cut out certain .........
I give Gigi credit for expanding the idea of what a GP bike can do. Certainly helped having all that Audi money and R&D behind him, but they are technical marvels of their time. Too bad it came at the expensive of the racing.
I really hope they get it right with 850cc bikes. Maybe we'll have some other highly corrupt third world country on the calendar by then too.
Misano
The one track on the schedule that I would dump in a heartbeat gets to host two races.
The one track on the schedule that I would dump in a heartbeat gets to host two races.
Of course it has been! Which other country has managed to cancel three races in two years?
Though I could see India getting there as well. No way Kazakhstan or India will happen in 2025.
I am genuinely sad that Mr Sagdiyev will not be able to give us a stirring rendition of the Kazak national anthem before the race.
It would have been a great olive branch from the western world to let Mr Sagdiyev also do the pit walk and interview various riders.
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Dorna want venues from all over the world, otherwise it becomes an European championship
