Casey Stoner: Ducati MotoGP title “more difficult”, Honda crown “more important”

Casey Stoner is among an elite group of riders to have won 500cc/MotoGP World Championships with more than one manufacturer.

The Australian stunned the paddock with victory on his 2007 Ducati debut, then stormed to the factory’s first MotoGP crown with ten wins and 14 podiums across 18 races.

The next best Ducati rider was long-time factory leader Loris Capirossi, just seventh in the standings and with less than half of Stoner’s points.

“Which title was more difficult? Ducati, for sure,” Stoner said during a visit to the MotoGP paddock this season. “The bike was incredibly difficult to ride.

“With Ducati, it was like every weekend was a fight... It was very, very difficult to get it working in the right area.

“So it was more stressful. We had engine failures and things. Luckily, never in the race. But it was the most difficult one, for sure, with Ducati.”

Caught out at the start of the 800cc era, Ducati’s Japanese rivals soon closed the gap.

Although Stoner finished title runner-up to Valentino Rossi with six wins in 2008, his victory tally dropped to four in 2009 and three in 2010, when he also struggled with health issues.

Nonetheless, Stoner remained head and shoulders clear of the other Ducati riders, who rarely featured on the podium.

Capirossi’s lone 2007 victory proved to be the only other Ducati win during Stoner’s four years at the factory, departing for Honda in 2011 having outscored his fellow Desmosedici riders by 23 wins to 1.

At Honda, Stoner again delivered immediate success, dominating his first season on the RCV with ten victories and a second MotoGP title.

“With Honda, everything sort of went my way that season,” Stoner said. “I made a couple of mistakes with setup and we overheated tyres and things like that.

“But at the same time, the championship went very, very smoothly.”

Asked which of his two MotoGP titles meant more, Stoner replied: “Probably the Honda one.

“It was just nice because we had so much criticism for so long.

“People, I suppose, didn’t understand until I went to Honda, and people moved around different manufacturers, what we were doing with Ducati.

“We, myself and my team, didn’t really get the recognition of what we were doing until we went to Honda. And then it was much easier to be competitive.”

Stoner added a further five MotoGP victories for Honda during an injury-interrupted 2012 season before retiring at the age of 27.