MOTOGP » Nakano to get factory Honda at Brno

Yeah you should....or just switch to nitrogen. Yawn.....

Surely nirtous would be better, what about the drive chain, I use lard is there anything on the market that is better and does not get thrown off in a few seconds

It's all about tires, tires, tires.

Honda is telling Michelin that they better get their act together cuz we're now officially testing a factory bike (Nakano) on Bridgestones for the rest of the season. Rossi bailed on Michelin for a reason. Everybody called it whining and had all these conspiracy theories. Can we all now agree that he was right? Honda thinks so.

It's '08, Michelin have relaxed tire rules from '07, Rossi is off their roster (I assume he needed a lot of pampering), and they still make a seriously embarrassing mistake like Laguna (bad enough to force official apologies in press releases).

You can't win a title when any part of the package consistently underperforms.

I wouldn't think Repsol has a choice about tires. If you remember last year that Bridgestone all but rejected Rossi and didn't want him at all. Bridgestone was strong armed into taking Rossi by Dorna with the threat of spec tires. Now if they didn't want Rossi why would they want HRC? It's a two way street - if HRC wants Bridgestone than Bridgestone has to want HRC. They don't have to take them and judging by last year they don't want anymore teams.

The tires comment is a good one. I didn't even think of that. I guess Honda is looking for some (quality) Bridgestone data. Up until Laguna Michelin was looking very good, very competitive. That was one of the best things about this season so far, the apparent parity between Bridgestone and Michelin. Alas, all good things must come to an end.

Even if Bridgestone want to keep playing the "we can't make enough tires" game, simply swapping the allocation to the Factory team in 09 means no additional production requirements for Bridgestone or Michelin. But I never even mentioned 09 so I don't know what you're talking about.

Honda can throw a factory bike at Nakano and at least get an idea if there really is an advantage using Bridgestones. It takes minimal effort on their part and they get some excellent data for comparison.

They wanna spin it as "rewarding Nakano's consistency", fine, but that's one weird yardstick considering Dovi and the points.

the question is...wud de angelis have got this ride had he not binned it in qualy at laguna...

surely he's worthy of it...and why the hell hasnt dovi got the support, ok he may have the ride next year..but why not give him so races to bed himself in on the better performing bike..

honda seem to be making a lash up of everything lately...nakano's a good rider, but i dont think he'll be a threat on a factory machine..

honda like to win, no matter who it is, so why give it to nakano, why not someone who's proven themselves on the bike..

oh well

What the thread is saying is Nakano speaks Japanese which seems to imply that HRC is not satisfied with the feedback from Hayden and Dani. Gotta blame it on something.

"why give it to nakano, why not someone who's proven themselves on the bike.."

Exactly.

Nakano hasn't proven himself on the bike but gets an upgrade?

Because he's on Stones.

They are evaluating.

"Language barrier"? Please. This is an international series and none of these guys are on their 1st trip around the block.

I think it is a win-win situation, they use their most experienced rider for developing the 2009 satellite bike as well as support the token japanese in MotoGP to give him a chance of staying on in 2009 (perhaps to be replaced by Takahashi after that?)
If they give Dovi the bike now he will overtake more official HRC bikes (like Hayden at Laguna) and that is embarrassing.
Besides, Dovizioso's spot for next year seems already sealed.
Some more gossip: Alberto Puig demands a wall between the pitboxes next year in Dovi comes to HRC.