Spies to Yamaha Italia?

Now that Corser has signed for BMW, that leaves a slot open for Spies at
Yamaha-Italia

Next year's WSB looks like being an interesting year. Loads of potential
stories.
- New BMW
- Biaggi on the new Aprilia
- New Suzuki
- Haga on the Corse Ducati
- Brits all over the place
- Spies. Maybe.

 

I'd still rather see Spies on a well funded Alstare Suzuki, if only
because I think he'd make a more immediate impact on the bike his
entire professional career has been based on.

I'm not entirely convinced about the competitiveness of the Yamahas
despite their current ranking as #2 and #3. I think the reason
they're as competitive as they are is because Haga just rides the shit
out of them. Corser, although doing well at #2 in points, only rarely
looks racey enough for a win and hasn't actually won one yet.
Watching the Yamaha I just get the impression that they're competitive
but they're absolutely on their limit to be so. Whereas the other
bikes seem to be at the limits of the tires more so than the bikes
which gives them a little more comfort room when they're at the limit
too. I base this partially on how uncompetitive the Yamahas are
around the world. Only the Italia WSBK squad seems to get anything
consistent out of them and I think the tires are helping them out in
that regard by pulling the competition back to them.

I do think WSBK needs some more good young talent though. I
understand they're getting some young Brits next year which is good.
If the future of WSBK is Neukirchner, Fabrizio, Lanzi, Kiyonari, et al
then I'm not too impressed or interested.

 

Really? How do you work that one out then? Or are you blinded by the
inability of anyone else to compete with them in AMA.

WSB has always been a mix of one set of riders on the way up, still
learning the trade and another set on the way down who haven't made it
in MotoGP. So, what?

Like say, 2 years at Yamaha, a championship in his second year and then
swapping places with Toseland or Edwards. That wouldn't be so bad, for
us or for him.

 

I know about Sykes to WSB Yamaha Italia, Rea to WSB Tenkate Honda,
Crutchlow to WSS Yamaha, and some rumours about Byrne to WSB
Sterilgarda Ducati. Any others?

Cheers,

 

Indeed. So how does that relate to Suzukis in other series? How does
that make Suzuki "probably the best bike out there" in those other
series?

You don't seem to like them but Kiyo, Neukirchner have been doing ok
this year. There'll be more next year.

Spies did well at three races that were really pretty odd. Good on him.
He probably ought to be in MotoGP. But I don't think he'd beat Vermeulen
or Capirossi over the whole of his first season. Doesn't look like we're
going to find out though.

 

Also rumoured, Haslam to Stiggy Honda. Laferty to Parkalgar Honda WSS.

 

I'm talking about WSB. Things are "different in the UK", of course.

I think Kiyo is doing pretty well, considering his success at tracks
where he's had a lot of recent experience. But the jury's still out on
how good he'll be in the longer run, it's not like he comes from a
"birthplace of champions" (Japan, not the UK). Neukirchner, I have
real doubts, as I said.

Sounds like you're subtly suggesting the "oddity" contributed to his
good results, which I would contest. Here's my take in detail:

Donington - First time on the '08 bike, first GP ever, first time at
Donington. Dry-wet-dry hurt him, even though he qualified 8th in the
wet, because he lost a day learning the track and bike in the dry and
that's how they raced. So he started slow but came on, and was running
at a top ten pace at least the last third of the race on his way to
14th.

Indy test - First chance to really feel out the bike, but he didn't
get the edge any of the regular would have out of those two days,
because it was the first time on his bikes (and not Capirossi's) and
first time with his team (the Japanese test team), so he was just
getting his feet wet while others would have been delving deep into
setup and tire selection.

Laguna - Running SB didn't help, and first time on qualifiers meant
starting 13th, ran in that position early then worked up to 7th,
finished 8th perhaps in part becausee he misunderstood that he was on
the last lap. That he was on Bridgestones on a Bridgestone weekend may
not have helped much, because Nicky and Dovi and de Puniet finished
ahead of him anyway and Dani and Lorenzo weren'r around at all. And he
was working on an abdominal infection, would be under the knife back
in Texas two days later.

Indy - Wet-dry-wet didn't help, because he lost any advantage the test
might have given him and as an AMA guy he doesn't have that much rain
experience. Was generally faster tha his regular teammates in
practice, qualified 5th with his teammates 13th and 15th, and finished
6th while they were 9th and 16th. And that was in the rain, with
Vermeulen being one of the best if not the best rain rider in the
series. And how many times has a Suzuki finished higher than 6th in
seven years of MotoGP, could you count them on your fingers and toes?
I'd guess so, with toes to spare.

Perhaps not, but the argument there I assume is that MotoGP teams
should never hire from anywhere other than 250 or other teams, because
a year to learn tracks is simply unacceptable. And of course the GP
testing rules don't allow such riders to get to know them before
racing there.

Anyway, I think WSB's best shot at coming back to a higher level on
riders is what's happening at Honda, the reinstitution of the old JIS
days in 500. Assuming the Gresini guys are finalized (Elias and de
Angelis), with Hayden gone now the odd man out is de Puniet, a 139-
pound Frenchman, so not that odd. The other five are all young, all
JIS, all ex-125/250, and all 125 pounds or less. "Compact" in Honda-
ese. And Honda may have felt that having their Japanese rider
(Takahashi at Scot) was more important than having an American
potential champion (Spies at JiR). Although Spies is most definititely
the wrong profile at 5-11 / 160, and his manager was saying at Indy
that they'd moved on beyond MotoGP as there were no rides worth having
left in play.

And then there's the absurdity of the 3rd Kawasaki, where it was said
that not only does the rider have to be Spanish but also Valencian...

 

Must be the cranks.

 

Looks like its now official. Spies to WSB with Yamaha Italia.

Rumour is that Guintoli will be going to BSB and Sykes old place at
Rizla Suzuki.

And another rumour that Hodgson's second year of his Honda contract will
be with HM Plant Honda in BSB.

 

The guy doing the BBC grid walk was saying Yamaha were trying to get Colin
Edwards to go to WSBK, and I was hoping that might make an opening for
Spies.

Dream on?

 

Right. Then we hear Josh Hayes say he's amazed how deep the talent pool is
there..... in WSS.

 

Incidentally, Phase One (The endurance racing team) speak very highly of
Hayes. He's raced for them a couple of times.

So Spies has a ride in WSB, Hayes may well get a ride in WSS. Are there
any other AMA refugees coming over?

 

I hear there's some rides in BSB still available.

 

This intrigues me - how is it that top level racing in the US, as a
sport, has enough money to pay big salaries for a handful of riders,
but cannot attract a breadth and depth of teams?

 

Heh, this is exactly what I've been trying to explain! When OEM's
dictate racing, not only does racing suffer, but racer's do too. Use to
be any AMA Champ was prized, not so much anymore and no one has to look
farther than OEM dominance to see why....

 

The only people who see advertising value in American road racing are
people who make sportbikes. This is partly because of the "Win on
Sunday, sell on Monday" effect. And it's partly because the racing
audience is largely composed of people who buy sportbikes. Non-
sportbike-manufactures have to deal with a more diffuse sponsorship/
product connection, and with the small size of the sportbike-buying
public. So the factories more or less call the shots, and if each one
can point to a frontrunner, they're all happy.

There's no incentive for the factories to broaden the audience to
people who aren't going to buy motorcycles. There's not even an
incentive for them to have an even playing field, because the last
thing they need is some scrappy upstart beating their factory team and
making them look dumb.

People make more money racing Supercross than they do AMA Superbike,
because the audience is big enough to bring in people who sell power
tools, pickup trucks, and the like.

-jake

 

Champ said

I was thinking about the mechanics of this as well, but from a
different angle. AMA factory riders had gotten to really pretty decent
salaries in the late '90s, although the top guys were still making
marginally less than the top guys in WSB (most GP guys made even
less). My guess that was in part a function of competition for the
best guys, who could do the winning they needed. Then the rider
salaries collapsed in WSB when the factories left, and have never
really come back. But there are some really good teams there, they
just don't seem to think spending on riders is as valuable as
improving the machines or something. The older name riders in WSB must
make considerable amounts of money beyond salary, personal
sponsorship, equipment deals, etc., and perhaps that has served to
suppress salaries some. Americans just don't make as much in that
category, they have to make theirs on salary.

The private team' just don't make enough money here to afford to pay
anyone very much, and that's just a function of the lack of real
popularity of the sport. Those teams don't spend much on equipment,
transporters, etc. either. And my guess is nationality biases in
Europe have some impact on what gets paid there, since ability and
results aren't the only factor, although what that impact is I don't
know..

 

Great insight, however was expecting you to wrap it up saying the Supercross
audience is larger because milliosn more ride dirt bikes than sportbikes.

The only people who see advertising value in American road racing are
people who make sportbikes. This is partly because of the "Win on
Sunday, sell on Monday" effect. And it's partly because the racing
audience is largely composed of people who buy sportbikes. Non-
sportbike-manufactures have to deal with a more diffuse sponsorship/
product connection, and with the small size of the sportbike-buying
public. So the factories more or less call the shots, and if each one
can point to a frontrunner, they're all happy.

There's no incentive for the factories to broaden the audience to
people who aren't going to buy motorcycles. There's not even an
incentive for them to have an even playing field, because the last
thing they need is some scrappy upstart beating their factory team and
making them look dumb.

People make more money racing Supercross than they do AMA Superbike,
because the audience is big enough to bring in people who sell power
tools, pickup trucks, and the like.

-jake

 

Surely there's a *huge* incentive for the factories to broaden the
audience to people who *might* buy motorcycles?

Over here, while the top salaries are considerably lower than in the
US, there's significant non-motorcycle sponsorship in BSB. The top
Ducati team is sponsored by Airwaves (a chewing gum). The main Yamaha
team is sponsored by Virgin (their mobile phone brand, I believe).

 

I suspected that was the case, but wasn't sure enough to state it. I
live in a very atypical part of the country in terms of motorcycling,
so my intuitions on this are all screwy.

-jake