Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/275014
IN THE WIND P22 achieve - which was to get comfortable on the bike again and get myself back-up-to-speed. With so long away from racing, I didn't have extreme ex- pectations at Cartagena, but we met every expec- tation that I had set myself and maybe a bit more; and the base setting on the Tyco Suzuki was really good. "The boys did a great job with the bike right off the bat. We hardly changed anything over the course of the four days. Yeah, we made some minor tweaks and adjustments to smooth things out, which then helped me to lower my lap-time on each of the four days, so yeah it was very suc- cessful. It's a great team and I've always enjoyed hanging out with guys from Northern Ireland so it's been really positive." MOTOGP: A THIRD CLASS? T he suddenly confusing world of MotoGP is about to get a bit more confusing with a new class slated to be run within the class – Factory 2. According to an interview with Dorna boss Car- melo Ezpeleta on the website motor.as.com, a third class within the class will become reality on March 11 when he gets it ap- proved. That means there will be the "Factory" class, the "Open" class and the "Factory 2" class. Confused yet? It might not be as bad as it sounds. The new "Factory 2" class is basically Dorna's answer to Ducati declaring at the deadline that it was going to run in the "Open" class, a class that will allow the Italian manufacturer to continue to develop its Desmosedici GP13 over the course of the season because development in that class isn't frozen. It also allows the Ducatis and other "Open" class bikes to use more fuel, softer tires and have more engines available during the year. As long as they use the Dorna provided ECU from Magneti Marelli. Should you choose to run any software that you want, use less fuel, harder tires and have your engine development frozen over the course of the season, you are in the "Factory" class. You are Repsol Honda, MoviStar Yamaha and Monster Tech 3 Yamaha. Javier Alonso, Managing Director of Dorna's Events Area, explained the proposal on the Mo- toGP website last week. "The proposal which has been made relates to Open entry manufacturers achieving podium re- sults, specifically three third positions, two second places or one victory, in dry race conditions," he said. "They would then have certain limitations ap- plied relating to the Open class (22.5 liters of fuel reduced from 24) and less engines available (the total reduced from 12 to 9). "We looked at the Sepang test results, espe- cially the second test, and it's clear that of the two software versions used, the second developed by Magneti Marelli offers great performance. The fact is that the only manufacturer ready to use that soft- ware is Ducati. That gives them some advantage when combined with the Open rules, so we have therefore made this plan to the GP Commission, to find a balance which does not give one manufac- turer too much of an advantage." Stay tuned. Dorna boss Carmelo Ezpeleta caused a bit of a stir last week with the announcement of the Factory 2 class in MotoGP racing. PHOTOGRAPHY BY GOLD & GOOSE