Joined Oct 2012
3K Posts | 725+
Crab Key
More trawling through old bike stuff unearthed another nice tale, one that'll be right up Jumkie's alley (so to speak, ahem).
Some excerpts from a report from El Mundo, June 2002 (coincidentally 10 years on from the previous FIM/Dorna/TWP contretemps I quoted):
The 'Big Racket' of Motorcycling.
Can you imagine a football match where the referee is the agent of one of the players on the pitch, works for another stadium, is the owner of one of the teams involved, and earns money from the sponsor of the other team? This is exactly what happens in the motorcycle world championship, which reduces the sports credibility by the avarice of the organisers.
Basically, Dorna CE and his mates were (are?) running events and taking money to run them off Repsol. They also represented Alex Criville and took 10% of his earnings.
The Dorna Chief of Communications, Latorre, was was working with Repsol on publicity.
Ezpeleta, Arroyo, Pons and Aldama stood to profit heavily after Arroyo organised to buy out Dorna from Banesto, owning, between them, 25% of the stock.
Pons and Arroyo also owned the Movistar Junior 125 team of Olive, Elias and Pedrosa.
All this kind of underground operation, which makes Dorna and its owners the judge and interested party of championship, hurts the competition
An example: Why did Tony Elias lose the 125 title last year? Did his refusal to renew his contract ieth the Dorna team have something to do with it? One objective fact exists. After Elias refused to sign just before the Australian GP, his bike stopped running (competitively)...and teh one that started running was Dani Pedrosa, his substitute in the Dorna team of Alberto Puig.
Now, much of this might be yellow press exaggeration, but this idea of the promoters skewing the championship isn't new....
Enjoy.
Some excerpts from a report from El Mundo, June 2002 (coincidentally 10 years on from the previous FIM/Dorna/TWP contretemps I quoted):
The 'Big Racket' of Motorcycling.
Can you imagine a football match where the referee is the agent of one of the players on the pitch, works for another stadium, is the owner of one of the teams involved, and earns money from the sponsor of the other team? This is exactly what happens in the motorcycle world championship, which reduces the sports credibility by the avarice of the organisers.
Basically, Dorna CE and his mates were (are?) running events and taking money to run them off Repsol. They also represented Alex Criville and took 10% of his earnings.
The Dorna Chief of Communications, Latorre, was was working with Repsol on publicity.
Ezpeleta, Arroyo, Pons and Aldama stood to profit heavily after Arroyo organised to buy out Dorna from Banesto, owning, between them, 25% of the stock.
Pons and Arroyo also owned the Movistar Junior 125 team of Olive, Elias and Pedrosa.
All this kind of underground operation, which makes Dorna and its owners the judge and interested party of championship, hurts the competition
An example: Why did Tony Elias lose the 125 title last year? Did his refusal to renew his contract ieth the Dorna team have something to do with it? One objective fact exists. After Elias refused to sign just before the Australian GP, his bike stopped running (competitively)...and teh one that started running was Dani Pedrosa, his substitute in the Dorna team of Alberto Puig.
Now, much of this might be yellow press exaggeration, but this idea of the promoters skewing the championship isn't new....
Enjoy.
