....... curve
Angel, here is the deal. The riders 1-10 in the standings are all pretty good, and almost close to equal in talent and ability, with a few differences, mainly race craft. But its the machine they ride accounts for most if not all of the differences you see on the track and finishing order. First of all there are two major types of entries, some called "prototypes" (all purpose built machines from head to toe) and the others called CRTs (production derived engine with a prototype chassis). For example, the factory Honda and Yamaha are the best (there has been a debate as to which of the two factories is the best, each position splitting hairs, so lets just say for the sake of argument they are about equal to eachother). Then, their own satellite Yamaha & Honda teams are next best, with the edge going to the Yamaha (probably because they simply have better riders). Then there is a major performance gap to the next machines, starting with factory Ducati, followed by their even worse satellite machines. The next performance gap splits up the CRT entries into another set of tiers in terms of performance. The top of the CRTs is the Aspar team using Aprillia derived engines. Then again, there is a major performance gap to the rest of the CRTs. There are some very good riders on CRTs too, but you won't know it from the finishing order. For example, Randy Depuniet, and as you mentioned, Collin Edwards would probably be in the top 7 if they were on satellite Yamahas. So this should give you a real good clue as to what accounts for the championship standings.
Oh, and the term "alien" is a lazy inaccurate superficial way for people to describe the top riders. Usually, the list include Casey, Pedro, and Lorenzo, though some people will include Rossi in that group. But you can see he is 7th in the standings, so as you can see, this term "alien" is in fact a ........ lazy term that does little to describe the actually reality of the sport in terms of its best riders. It is no coincidence that 3 of the 4 "aliens" are on the best factory bikes, while the one missing "alien" is on a Ducati. Again, the parity of the machines they ride should give you a clue about the performance of the bike, but not necessarily the talent and ability of the rider compared to the rest. Just a thought, but I contend, if you were to put all of the currently riders that people describe as "aliens" on a factory Ducati, none would win, maybe not even podium all season, except maybe Casey Stoner. What does that tell you about this term "alien" then?
