well i'm late to the discussion but i saw the race. i was pretty mad for stoner. i don't care if he wins but it just seemed like a bad move to make on a wet track. i was wondering how many would actually cross the finish line. they started dropping off like flies. i like spies and was so happy when it looked like he'd finish on the podium. then his bike decided it was tired and needed a nap.
somewhat unrelated... i know this isn't the case but i really looked like ALL the marshalls were chomping at the bit to help valerie but didn't really care to do much to help stoner out. i'm sure there's stuff going on that i didn't see and hear, but it sure seemed that way to a noobie watcher. i actually wondered if they were part of valerie's team and that's why they didn't help stoner. it wasn't until i saw everyone else going down that i realized that's simply what those people did.
I think it may have had more to do with Lorenzo and Pedrosa....2 Spaniards on fast bikes that Casey was a direct rival too...they would of been more likely thinking of their Spanish boys, rather than Rossi...but dont forget, Moto GP is massive in Spain, and as such, so is Rossi....Stoner has always been painted as the bad boy (non-european), regardless of the fact that he is the winningest rider of the 800cc Moto GP era...
Whatever the story is, Rossi's move was just a little bit more than dubious, and as far as i am concerned, my intial view still stands, the actions of a desperate man, trying to hang on to his glory days, which as it all unravel's, seem to be well and truly over....
And i dont mean that in a Rossi hating way...the facts are pretty clear....injuries, faster team mates, more favoured by the Factory(Yamaha)that once could not do without the media Mogul, Rossi! As such Rossi turned to the most obvious option....An Italian Manufacturer (Ducati), that have always struggled to compete against the Japanese factories, who knew 18 months ago they were losing the only guy who could make their bike win, Stoner to Honda.
As such, Ducati killed their WSBK factory team, to make sure they could afford Rossi, in the hope that they could conjure up a "miracle" from the ageing master of Moto GP, along with his "sidekick", and master of winning WC's, Jeremy Burgess, and his team of merry Aussies, that have countless WC's on their CV's...
But as it is all seeming to be a bit hard, Rossi saw an opportunity on the level playing field that a wet track becomes for an underpowered, or evil handling bike...Rossi, using his years of Racing "guile", decided that this was his opportunity to make a star of himself, and went nuts, riding the bike way beyond the "limit" in the wet, till he crashed....as Stoner said, "your ambition outweighed your talent", in other words, you were never going to hold onto that bike, riding like that in those conditions, thanks for fu***** my day!
Rossi is not stupid, Stoner was his target to beat, and in this case, he saw Stoner just up ahead, and lost his $hit! Lorenzo is better than that, as is Stoner, and Pedrosa, and so did Valentino used to be....but these days he is "behind the game" and it shows...just my honest opinion....and i have watched just about every GP race since about 1986, so i reckon i can see stuff for what it is, even if i am pro Stoner....as i should be, cause i am an AUSSIE!
:thumbup:
