Moto GP

[Gassick]

Racing Starts 12 April Doha/Losail, Quatar

Some Goss

After meeting with the team managers in Bologna, Carmelo Ezpeleta headed to Borgo Panigale to talk with Ducati head honchos to see if they can put more bikes on the grid for the 2010 season.

Cirano Mularoni Team Scotâ€s manager is very interested in setting up a team in the future Moto2 and has bought two Honda CBR600rr and will probably test them this summer.

John Hopkins could join Sete Gibernau in Onde 2000 if the Nieto Brothers and Francisco Hernandez can convince Ducati to lease them another GP9.

Instead of 18 GPâ€s this year we may only get 17, the Hungarian Gp scheduled for the 20th of September may not happen, due to delays in the construction of the Balatonring circuit.

French engineering firm Solution F could be interested in helping Bartholomey with Kawasaki engines.

Suzuki will be testing in Sepang next week, but Paul Denning denies that Suzuki has definitely lost title sponsor Rizla for the 2009 world championship campaign.

The economic crisis has hit MotoGP even harder than expected, certain teams will now be flying economy instead of business class.

Valentino Rossi was spotted at Madonna del Campiglio with a new lady friend.

Marco Melandri won a race this year, not the GP rider, a horse named Marco Melandri won a race at the Montegiorgio race track.

James Toseland is staging another of his pre-season send-off parties ahead of his second assault on the MotoGP world championship.

Marco Melandri, the rider, has tried drumming up sponsors on Italian Radio DeeJay.


Meanwhile the financial crisis continues, and in an effort to reduce costs there will be some other changes .... as early as this year;

2009
Weekend practice sessions will be reduced by 15 minutes each to a total of 45 mins only
Warm-ups will be 10 mins only
No monday (post race) testing
Limit of 9 motors for the whole season per rider
Maximum 8 days of winter testing
No testing after Valencia until the start of the next season
2010
One less race (down to 17 GPs)
Only one bike per rider
No more carbon disks, back to stainless steel
Races will be a two-day affair, no riding on Fridays
Paddocks open to the public on Fridays
Each engine will have to last 3 races
Each team will have to sell their engines to another team at reduced prices

SENSATIONAL !!!!!!!
I feel complete, ready for the season ahead !Roll on April 12. LOAFIE, I hope you did this during work hours!