well said ... Dani will have to face a whole host of riders who want to win next season... he is going to be squished.

Does anyone know or have the comments in which Hayden made towards Alberto Puig after he said that Hayden was stealing the setups from Him and Pedrosa? Im interested In Hayden's comments im glad he lashed back out.

I don't have it but on his Sepang press conf a guy asked him about it and he answered: "I'm here to talk about this race, but I'll keep what I said"! I also want to know what he said before...

Gi

Yes its definately interesting... Hope someone can help us... ?

Thank you, MotoGP.com. You made it an honor to be able to watch the FIM awards. It was the perfect way to allow the fans to say good bye to the season and congratulate our racers and teams

Thank you for bringing us the live coverage throughout the season.



Forza Vale - class, charisma, CHAMPION

Congratulations, Vale !

Fanali Finale: MotoGP's Most-Experienced Crew Chief Retires

by dean adams
Monday, October 27, 2008

Veteran crewchief Fiorenzo Fanali has worked with a generation of great riders in his career, including four-time world champion Eddie Lawson at Cagiva in the early 1990s. Here they discuss set-up on a cloudy day at Laguna Seca.
image by dean adamsKids today: they think music is free and that it's possible grounds for an emergency if they are away from home without a cell phone. Meanwhile, in the pit lane of your favorite racetrack, very soon will come a day when there won't be one technician who in his formative days had to learn how to jet a carburetor. To him, a 'set of smoothbores' will be a euphemism for a pit tootsie's bust.
After a season working with rider John Hopkins on the Kawasaki MotoGP team, veteran crewchief Fiorenzo Fanali announced his retirement from racing last weekend at Valencia.
With a conflicted image, he has both a hang-dog face and tireless energy, Fanali has worked his way through three different generations of Grand Prix, seeing the class change from its four-stroke origins in the late 1960s change to the light and nasty two-strokes of the seventies and then back to four-stroke in the new millennium.
The list of riders that Fanali has worked with in his race technician years is incredible: he began working with Giacamo Agostini at MV Agusta in '67 when he was little more than a boy. From there, the Italian toiled at Yamaha for more than a decade, tuning for Eddie Lawson and many other Brand Y stars. He made a switch to World Superbike in the 1990s, working on Yamaha's factory team, where he tuned for Colin Edwards and Nori Haga. Back in GP by the end of the century he worked with Max Biaggi, Marco Melandri and others at Yamaha before moving to Kawasaki in 2004.
Fanali says that it wasn't the travel or the other drudgery of the race mechanic life which made him think about retirement. It was the lack of winning. Comparing the MVs as ridden by Mike Hailwood and Agostini in the 1960s with what Hopkins and his lot tore around on this season in MotoGP is either vastly different or very similar depending on your perspective. While the technology associated with the bikes has made them into very large, loud and fast computers, MotoGP technicians today try to solve the same problems they did in 1965: finding a balance between bike and rider, making the rear tire last, trying to build a bike which runs hard until the checkered flag. A well-sussed crewchief and crew is paramount in importance.
In a forty-year career in the race garage, Fanali did a remarkable job of staying current, especially considering he comes from a generation which seems to distrust computers and electronic solutions.
To be very good, crewchiefs and mechanics need to be almost as cut-throat competitive as their riders. The long hours, dizzying travel and energy-sapping schedule mean that the people who stay in the racing life long-term are motivated by something other than money or prestige. It's about winning or the possibility of a win that feeds their racing passion. Fanali says that it wasn't the travel or the other drudgery of the race mechanic life which made him think about retirement. It was the lack of winning.




With Christmas, and the associated depression that it inevitably brings, just around the cold and frosty corner MGPN is giving you a chance to bid for possibly the greatest all-American t-shirt available on this or any planet.

That's right, a MotoGPNews Mamola t-shirt signed by the cast and crew of the World Superbike race in America. Confused? Me too, but it for surely is a beaut!

Here's what Joseph, MGPN's World Superbike reporter, had to say:-

"First, I asked Spies what MotoGP team he would be on next year just before making him sign the SBK Mamola shirt, likely jinxing him."

"Second, it still makes me laugh how the only guys refused to make any contact with fans/sign stuff (Rolfo, Biaggi, Aoyama, Tamada, Checa) all fall into the 'recent MotoGP guys who are probably bitter they are in SBK' category."
Interested? Bidding will be done on ebay via the following link:-

Signed MotoGPNews Mamola 02 T-Shirt on eBay, also Clothing, Superbikes, Motor Sport Memorabilia, Sports Memorabilia (end time 01-Nov-08 08:04:02 GMT)

Postage will be arranged after the auction has ended. If you have any concerns regarding the price of the postage, or any other concerns, then email us at the usual address.

How tempting is that t-shirt!!! It's now on my watched list & I'm keeping a close eye on it too!!! I mean, Troy Bayliss won't be signing too many t-shirts any more will he

OK, here's the story about the mentioned probability Petronas to sponsor the present Fiat Yamaha team. I spoke to an insider in Petronas and he said that the offer was made by Yamaha Japan because the Fiat sponsorship hasn't been renewed and the Japan people want some other option in case Fiat doesn't want to renew the sponsorship deal. Petronas is keen on the offer but nothing has finalised at this moment.

The reason Yamaha Japan offered Petronas is because Yamaha and Petronas are working hand in hand to develop motorcyle racing in the Asian region and the development project has been going on for almost 5 years. At this moment, 3 main regional supersports team are being sponsored by Petronas i.e, Petronas Yamaha Malaysia Racing Team, Petronas Yamaha Thailand and Petronas Yamaha Indonesia. So for Petronas, being offered to be a partner in a premier class Yamaha team is also a good oppurtunity to be involved extensively with Yamaha in developing motorcycle racing and also a platform to be in the motorcycle scene other than in F1 through BMW Sauber team.

thank u han!

I been waiting for news about the next years sponsor for ages!

Thanks a lot Han!!!!

BMW has a nice color scheme... blue and white !

Gi