Oh and that was just the races he completed, if you divide it by the 9 races he finished its actually over 10 seconds a race behind!

"How is it that Stoner could win on this thing then?"

Not to burst your bubble here but it took THIRTEEN races for him to win in 2010. With an extraordinary talent like Casey riding does that sound like a race winning bike? Pedrosa was also out for the last 5 races and Rossi was struggling with his injuries. If you combine the deficit over those 13 rounds he was 1 minute 32 seconds off victory, about 7 seconds a race on average. There is no way he could be winning on this new ducati.

@ hindsight, herewego

you guys are looking at the current performance deficit the Ducati had to Yamaha and Honda and extrapolating that Stoner would not be able to win races on it, but looking at Ducatis historical performance gap to the front without Stoner there (looking at Capirossi, Hayden, Melanesia), we see that they were usually just as uncompetitive then as they are now, sometimes even more so! So there I'd EVERY reason to believe Stoner could won races on the current Desmo, especially when you take into account how peerless he is at certain tracks such add Qatar, Aragon and Phillip Island.

rossi didnt need a yamaha or a honda what he needed was a bike that responded to set up so he could weight the bike naturally and progressively to the track /tyre conditions and this is what dovi is now finding whatever he does the basic design of the bike is inhibiting this... and theres a long hard road ahead... lets hope ducati listen to dovi because they wasted the last rider who had the exsperience gained with both of their principle competitors to tell them why their opposition is doing so well and theyre not.... the desperate but genius tallents of casey are no longer an option . A because hes realised on a honda he doesnt need to kill himself on and B because the others have moved on way too much for caseys compensatory efforts to keep em in the game even if he does return next year

How is it that Stoner could win on this thing then?
Seems to me like he understood the bike better and that Ducati have been chasing their tails trying to suit the bike to different riders rather than the riders coming to grips with how the bike needs to be ridden.

Dovizioso explained that the biggest problem is actually that the Desmosedici has no single weakness - it is lacking a little in all areas - plus the necessary lead time to produce new parts.

This compounds the conclusion that the entire motorcycle is flawed.

ditching the carbon frame was the first logical step.. rossi and jb realised streight away the weightdistribution was all wrong and they had no mechanism to adjust this other than using the suspension to load the front at the exspense of reargrip or rear causing chronic understeer (simply put).. the only logical(and cheepest) option available to facilitate this and free up the effectiveness of suspension adjusment was to susspend the engine within an adjustable medium....this was the FIRST logical step but ducati couldnt swallow their pride enough and ****d around for a whole year with alloy air boxes swingarms galore with exactly the same problems... when they did finally get around to a cradle frame it emerged rushed with no parallel development alternative so when initial results suggested the engine configuration was still offseting progress and alot more frame/engine development was needed.(not to mention tc )rossi and jb knew time had ran out .....

Ha I bet 50 quid if stoner the moaner was on the duke
Now he would be struggling... He was on a slippery
Slope when he jumped ship and was whinging
That Ducati weren't listening to things he wanted
Done .....

First of all it was not the same bike, if we remember correctly it was the GP11.1 which was a de-stroked GP12. The GP 12 felt better because it had more torque and got out of the corners quicker, meaning it spent less time cranked all the way over. The GP11.1 lost all that torque and the initial problems came right back because the 800 needs that corner speed.
And for those touting the trellis frame, remember even Stoner said that no two were alike even when set up exactly the same. That is caused by too many welds. It is almost impossible to get consistency. And the trellis frame severely impaired the air box size.
No, Ducati needs to go to a 72 or 65 degree V four, stack the gearbox, and get the mass as close to the center as possible. Then and only then can they move the engine around enough to get it right. Keep the twin spar frame and use the longest spars possible to mount the engine, this gives enough flex to absorb bumps when heeled over and prevent chatter. Lengthen the swin

"LOL. Stoner won 3 of the last 4 races before he handed the bike over to Vale. It was still capable of looking competitive with an extraordinary talent like Stoner. "

...and spat him off on the warm up lap of the 4th. It was still capable of looking uncompetitive with an extraordinary talent like stoner and then confirmed uncompetitive with an extraordinary talent like rossi