Good read from cycle news.

^^Valentino eating humble pie...., last paragraph of first page of cycle news article...,

I seriously hope that Vale comes up to speed..., my concepts of God are being shaken.., call me a fanboy, if you will...

Jorge's words are that of a mature guy.., he understands that nothing is to be gained by writing off Rossi..., his poor performance is doing all the damage...and doesn't needs any more fuel to the fire...,
and I would say that given a competitive bike....Lorenzo is capable of taking the fight to Stoner...(read fast & consistent)..

Large hullabaloo over the SOPA..., btw do we have any redditors on this thread??...a lot of discussions going on over there...

If that is true, then all RESPECT to the man he has become. Lack of close fights, man don't we all feel it?

Must watch guys...
Barry Sheene Legacy trailer - YouTube

^^ Wow! That slide just before the crash(@175mph) is menacing!

Good find, mate! Don't know why, I never liked the idea of Rossi moving to Ducati back then!

Had he thought about Rizla Suzuki? It wasn't closer to the championship-winning M1 but, neither was M1 back in 2004!
The way Bautista and his team made it work in the latter part of the season makes me feel that the machine could have done something very impressive at the hands of Rossi(and his team).

Probably for the first time I really liked how Lorenzo responded to an interview, especially when he had to say something about Rossi. He's obviously correct in saying that it would be a mistake to underestimate Rossi. Ofcourse, how can anyone underestimate this man just because of one bad season. And like they say, an injured tiger is more dangerous. It has been Rossi's worst year in his career, and he knows the criticism he is getting around the world. Not only his result, he also lost his dear friend Marco. So this year was as bad as it could get for Rossi.

But hey, his comeback next year would be sweeter than the sugar after this devastating year. Now who wouldn't want to see that?

OT: Thanks to King just came to know about redditors. Signing up now

As the article says Vale and his team underestimated Ducati-Stoner duo and thought like everybody else that the rider was the problem and not the bike.

I second this. Also Rossi would have brought in more sponsors and better financial backing for the development of the gsv-r.

Well IMHO, Suzuki simply couldn't afford Rossi and the all Italian Dream was something the world was looking forward to.

^ I still don't understand how it works! The Japanese bikes 're sold at a higher frequency compared to that of the jokers from the Italian sheds world wide. How on earth can Suzuki run out of money?!

PS: Calling all fans, the UK Road Racing 2012 Thread is up!

Living in the old world pal Motorcycle sales have slumped all over.
Also the catastrophe in Japan in March made it worse for the Japs.
Even the Big Honda is feeling the heat (See the number of factory bikes next year by Honda and compare it with this year). Kawasaki and Suzuki being the smallest of the Japs are suffering the most.
The bigger markets like US, Europe hasn't been good to the Motorcycle sales.
Also motorcycle production is just another department within the big Jap heavy machineries industry. With sales anyways going down the corporates will consolidate their spending to bare minimal and concentrate on their efforts somewhere else.

Suzuki Volkswagen alliance also has got a lot to do with their decision to back off from racing "temporarily".

Ducati was probably able to hire Rossi (I guess his yearly salary is 14 million euros) because of the backing of the cigarette company Marlboro and other big giants like Enel, Generali, etc.
However as mentioned by Carlo Pernat long back, this backing might not be there forever if the results like current year is repeated.
Rossi might just be forced out of MotoGP if he doesn't give results soon.

^ Yeah, I knew a bit of those stories!

Aahh ! The Rockstar.. the harder men from a harder era. Breaking a bone and returning to racing and calling it a ' COMEBACK ' sounds so fussy for these Men !

^^ OT: They should have "like/+1/LOL" button for each post in the forum.

Bad news in the morning