VOL. 53 ISSUE 18 MAY 10, 2016 P91
departed to Honda. Jorge would
like to outdo his rival here as well.
Casey's test lap times give him
another peripheral target.
Then there is history. Since
1949, only five riders have won
the premier class on different
makes of machine—Geoff Duke,
Giacomo Agostini, Eddie Law-
son, Valentino Rossi and Casey
Stoner. Only Lawson and Rossi
did it in consecutive years.
Now there's a motivating target,
for this year and next.
Finally, the money. No details
have emerged, beyond that it is
a great deal. Yamaha had offered
him "our best-ever proposal," ac-
ROSSI'S BIG MISTAKE
Valentino Rossi's reasons
for swapping to the big
red bikes in 2010 were
largely personal and to do
with Yamaha's relation-
ship with Lorenzo, but
also based on a certainty
that whatever Stoner
could do, he could do
better.
Casey had won the
title in 2007, handsomely
outpointing Pedrosa and
Rossi with 10 wins. He
continued to win races
for the next three years,
though by the end, on
the carbon-framed bike,
it was too often a case of
win or crash. "The bike
was a wild animal," he
told me later.
Rossi's famed crew
chief Jerry Burgess re-
marked that it would only
take a couple of races to
sort out the setting issues
that were tipping Stoner
down the road. Two
years later, looking rather
wearier, they had still not
found the key. And Rossi
was having to get used to
midfield finishes.
Until that point, he had
won 79 GPs in 11 years—
an average of 7.2.
With Ducati, it slumped
to 6.0. He visited the
podium only three times,
and managed a best of
two second places.
Things stand differently
for Lorenzo, as Rossi has
been keen to point out
ever since the rumors
first surfaced. The Ducati
team and especially the
Desmosedici are at a very
different level from when
he joined.
Pity he didn't spot it
in time. The all-Italian
misadventure is one of
only three big mistakes
in his gilded career—with
crashing in the last race
at Valencia in 2006,
handing Hayden the title;
and the did-he/didn't-
he kick at Marquez at
Sepang last year.
Gigi Dall'Igna,
the man with the
most famous
monobrow in
MotoGP.
Rossi, for all his genius and influence, simply could
not make the spiteful Desmo work.
open, and became a cause ce-
lebre, with partisan fans mostly
siding with Rossi—hence vocifer-
ous booing of both Lorenzo and
Marquez at Qatar. And a power-
ful extra reason for Jorge to take
on a new adventure.
It means a lot to racing, and
to Lorenzo.
As well as his usual target—
the championship, for himself
and for Ducati—there are other
specific goals.
One is obvious. Do what
Rossi couldn't, on a bike that
may be very different, but is
also basically the same.
There is also the matter
of Casey Stoner, presuming
Ducati's only champion so far
(2007) continues his test-rider
duties. Rossi couldn't match
Casey's success—he'd won
three races the year before he
