Michael Scott | July 19, 2023
Cycle News In The Paddock
COLUMN
A Leg-Up For MotoGP’s Struggling Giants
How the mighty are fallen. This is the only possible interpretation of the news that Dorna is considering making concessions available to Honda and Yamaha. “Concessions” being exceptions to restrictive regulations, intended to give weaker competitors a chance to catch up. And “weaker competitors” now being the long-standing motorcycle grand prix giants, who are currently getting a good kicking from Ducati in particular and Europe in general.
This smacks of desperation on both sides. Not only are the factories faltering, so too Dorna, at least potentially. The leveling-down rules, introduced to hamstring the all-dominant factory teams and to attract new manufacturers, have now gone too far. There’s a real fear that the floundering Japanese duo will lose interest in getting serially beaten and will follow Suzuki into MotoGP oblivion, leaving a semblance of a one-make series, with wall-to-wall Ducatis. An oblivion of a different kind.
Implausible? Not necessarily. The two racing giants are really struggling, entirely because of Dorna’s initiative some 20 years ago.
Back then, Dorna cracked the whip, threatening to end prototype grand prix racing altogether. The threat of switching to production-based racing was underlined by the introduction of the unloved hotted-up proddie-bike CRTs, circulating at the back.
That certainly got the factories’ (if not the fans’) attention, who were then prepared to accept a crescendo of cost-cutting dumbing-down rules. Starting with fuel limits and control tires, increasingly restrictive tech regs cut factory-team advantages and nullified big-budget bullying. The practice went further year on year—control electronic hardware preceded control software, engine numbers were restricted, and engine and more recently aerodynamic developments were frozen during the season. Engines were physically sealed before the first race of the year.
There’s a real fear that the floundering Japanese duo will lose interest in getting serially beaten and will follow Suzuki into MotoGP oblivion.
Cost curbs pandered to independent teams, while the tech limitations attracted new factories, notably Aprilia and KTM, although not Kawasaki. Most importantly, the new junior recruits were allowed to side-step the worst of the restrictions because of the formal concession system.
This gave them the chance to catch up with Honda and Yamaha. But now it is the beleaguered giants who need help, to recover ground that was snatched away.
The concessions had several elements. On the sporting side, while factory teams and especially factory riders had to adhere to a very limited number of permitted tests, concession teams had absolute freedom.
Technical concessions were of even more value. Most importantly, engine development was free. While the big boys were stuck with any design errors they may have made over the winter, concession teams could play around as much as they liked. They were also allowed more engines per rider through the season.
Concession status was maintained until a certain level of success was achieved—points being accrued by dry-weather podiums and wins.
All three European marques, Ducati, Aprilia and KTM benefited from these extra freedoms. So also did Suzuki, who were allowed to return to concession status after losing their way on the technical side.
Honda’s unhappiness has been coming steadily ever since Marc Marquez got hurt in 2020. In fact, it had already started before that. This thanks to a rider whose vaulting skills covered up misdirected development, and even encouraged a level of complacency that has come back to bite them. And also to bite the rider whose drive to win remains undiminished, but whose only asset is ultra-risky hard braking, which has led him into a series of crashes.
Yamaha’s decline has been more stealthy, thanks to their own genius-level rider Quartararo, able to exploit an otherwise increasingly outclassed bike’s high corner speed to take the title in 2021. But the signs were already there. Other Yamaha riders struggled to match his results, while the rival bikes have improved steadily. And now Fabio—like Marquez—is forced to over-ride only to under-perform.
If Honda’s weakness was obvious, it would be fixable, but one problem and perhaps the root cause is thought to be an unfriendly response at initial throttle opening, which unsettles the bike. This could probably be cured by changing crankshaft inertia, which also has a significant effect on various aspects of handling.
In other words, if allowed to experiment with engine development, HRC would at worst be able to eliminate one potential problem area, and at best sort their problem out, saving the badly battered Marc from further injury.
Yamaha suffers a basic shortage of torque and horsepower. And with design frozen, their hapless riders (just two since the factory was dumped in favor of Aprilia by their satellite team) are likewise struggling.
For each, the chance to change their engines could make a huge difference.
Let’s hope so. If Honda—the winningest make in 75 years of the championship—were to walk away, it would not be for the first time, while GP racing without Yamaha has been unthinkable since the 1960s. CN
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