Tyres and teams...

Since the purpose is to reduce cornering speeds, let's choose Michelin. They're clearly the slowest!

that article doesn't seem to contain anything that hasn't already been reported here this week?

Just get on and make the announcement & avoid this speculation. Anyway why would a team like Ducati make a shock switch to Michelin - when the Michelin is considered not up to the standard of a Bridgestone.

Seems like a silly season story to me....

I've wondered this as well.

MCN etc etc were making a big fuss about how a single tyre rule was going to be avoided by Ducati, kawasaki, gresini and lcr switching back to michelin next year.

But as this story says, that doesn:t make any sense at all! How does some teams changing back to michelin improve safety???

In all the stories I read about it NO ONE has addressed that point and NO ONE seems to have suggested ways in which bridgetsone and michelin coudl both stay but reduce cornering speeds.

The safety issue is just an excuse brought up by Dorna to justify the single tyre rule.
The real reason is probably money, in any shape or form.

I agree with you Morgue. In fact i think it was done to make the racing closer, no matter what they say about saftety and cost.

But at least the tyre companies could have gone down fighting (and made Dorna awkward) if they had submitted a proposal to stablise corner speeds whilst keeping tyre competition open.

The awkward situation is that more and more riders were jumping to Bridgestone anyway,
this would have resulted in a Michelin pullout in time as well. They were slowly rendering themselves useless.

How about bringing back 990s, didn't they go round corners slower? Oh, I forgot, they were scrapped because they were unsafe.

Basically it's Dorna cynically playing the safety card to justify their actions, as they've got a fundamental aversion to telling the truth.

Yes, Michelin was losing riders. But so what? Even if they were down to zero riders, Dorna would have to do something. Remember that Stoner and Rossi get top rubber, so where would that leave Honda if they switched? We need a spec tyre, at least the same for the 5 factory teams.

What people don't talk about and I find extremely funny is that after Cap won some races on 'stones in 2005 and 2006, Stoner crushing everybody in 2007 and Rossi and Stoner doing the same in 2008, Kawa only tried to adapt their bikes to the winning 'stones in the middle of this year. Like wtf is that all about? What were they doing before? Completely clueless.

Corner speeds? Safety? Phh, MotoGP bikes don't corner as fast as 250s yet let alone 125s. It's 100% about the show. What caused the problem in the first place? Messing with the rules... The change to 800cc bikes and tyre limitations. The show suffered cause Ducati got a big jump on the other manufacturers with these new rules. The rest are still catching up now. Jerry Burgess said all that is needed is a stable period for manufacturers to catch up and things to even out and there will be closer competition, but said more rule changes will just make it worse. "Another change means somebody is going to get a handle on it first and there will be the same disparity for another two years" cont.

"We are closer than we were last year and Honda will be better next year. If we leave it alone Carmelo won't have any worries in another year." As usual JB is the voice of wisdom. I don't think Carmelo will be listening however.

it was reported earlier at the bbc website that michelin was involved in talks with ducati, reportedly failing because of ducati wanting exclusive rights for the next 3 years over honda and yamaha factory teams.
hypertext: news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/motorsport/motorbikes/7640380.stm
and i would argue that the closer the racing gets, the more dangerous - with that it would be better to have huge differences, spreading the field with several seconds between each rider

When are these idiots like Ezpeleta going to grasp the very simple and painfully obvious fact that the real problem with Motogp was the move away from the 990s to 800s, Not one person in Motogp can give a good reason why this happenned.

Given the very close relationship between Repsol honda, dorna and ezpeleta I'd suggest the logical conclusion is that Bridgestone already have the single tyre contract, that's why Dani's sudden switch - so he can get info on the new tyres ahead of the rest of the Michelin riders - Dorna desperately want a Spanish rider to be competitive...it's where their money base ....

Ducati wanted the exclusive rights because they cannot beat Rossi when on the same tyre.

thats the reason they stuck with Bridgestone during the rough years and would be quite happy to jump to michelin. If they can develop a tyre that rossi does not have, thats their advantage over him.

They dont want a single tyre rule because everyone will have the same tyres and that makes it harder for their pog handling rocketships to win.

Ducati want clear distance between them and the rest of the field to avoid the fight

reason ducati wants to develop tires for themselves has everything to do with Rossi, but not what you think dfred. Rossi will always get the best tires with whatever brand he runs. Its all money, whatever Rossi uses will boost sales more than anyone else. So he will always get the best tires no matter what...spec rule or not...thats how business works, and racing is a business..