Paddock Press: Reggiani on Capirossi´s 2008 season

Former rider Loris Reggiani is well qualified to review Loris Capirossi´s season as part of the Paddock Press series, having commentated on the experienced Italian´s exploits over the course of the year. Now working for Italian television coverage of the MotoGP World Championship, Reggiani has seen no dip in effort for Capirossi since his switch to Suzuki. `The only thing I can say about Loris is that he gives 100% at every race, he´s a generous rider and I never met anyone like him,´ says Reggiani.

`Giving that much as his age, everytime he gets on track, it´s amazing. What I cannot say is what the level of his bike was. His team mate Chris Vermeulen never had exceptional performances in this championship so we don´t really know what the Suzuki is worth; we´ll have to wait another to see if Loris can win races even with the Suzuki, but fortunately he's a very patient guy!´

Tomorrow´s Paddock Press is a double-header, with the focus falling on Nicky Hayden and Anthony West.

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Paddock Press: Oxley on Hayden´s 2008 season

Paddock veteran Mat Oxley is assigned the task of analysing Nicky Hayden´s final year onboard Honda machinery as Paddock Press focuses on former champions. The Briton sees 2008 as a difficult year for the 2006 titlist, although he gives credit for Hayden´s efforts.

It´s been a tough old year for Nicky Hayden. This year has been even more difficult for him than 2007, mainly because he´s been developing a bike all year; he swapped bikes in the middle of the season, getting the pneumatic valve RCV212V and pretty much since then he's been developing the bike. That´s why you see that his results really started to come good in the last few races of the season,´ says Oxley.

`He´s a big fighter and I´m sure we all look forward to see how he goes next season on the Ducati.´

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Paddock Press: Puigdemont on Lorenzo´s 2008 season

Rookie of the Year and title contender in his first season in MotoGP, Jorge Lorenzo was one of the sensations of 2008. He also became one of the most popular sporting figures in his native Spain, with the press committed fans of his brutal honesty and hard-riding ways. Oriol Puigdemont from Spanish daily El Pais speaks about Lorenzo´s year in Paddock Press, part of a series of reviews looking at the protagonists of the 2008 season. Puigdemont sees a stronger Lorenzo compared to the rider who won the 250cc title in 2006 & 2007, and even he who started the season so impressively in his first three races.

`Crashes in Shanghai and Barcelona I think made him a bit more worried about himself, but he recovered from this for a strong finish to the season,´ says the Spanish journalist. `He has made himself a safer rider and better physically, and I think that he is in great condition for what in theory is his first true shot at being a title challenger.´

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Paddock Press: Bishop on West´s 2008 season

Anthony West´s 2008 season was one to forget for the Australian, as he tried to follow up an impressive half-year with Kawasaki in his first full campaign with factory machinery. Like `Team Green´, Paddock Press goes `in house´ for today´s installment of the review series, as motogp.com´s Duncan Bishop analyses West´s performances over the past twelve months.

`2008 was a `make-or-break´ year for West, but he started on the back foot when teammate John Hopkins got injured in testing. The bike wasn´t ready for the opening races, and their were continual grip problems from then on,´ says the motogp.com journalist.
< `The year did neither West nor Kawasaki any favours, and both take their share of responsibility for the results. West is undoubtedly a talented rider, but he may find another MotoGP ride hard to come by.´ Also featured in Paddock Press today is Mat Oxley´s review of Nicky Hayden´s final year as a Honda rider.

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Brivio warns rivals that Rossi run could be `typical´

Fiat Yamaha boss Davide Brivio has stated that, when everything is working well, Valentino Rossi´s recent race results are `typical´ from the Italian.

Two victories from the most recent pair of races have put Valentino Rossi back on top of the MotoGP World Championship for the first time in a year and, with Jorge Lorenzo upholding his end of the bargain Fiat Yamaha now hold a comfortable lead in the team standings. A content Davide Brivio sent out a warning to the rest of the MotoGP riders after Le Mans, one that they will not want to hear heading to Mugello.

`When Rossi feels good on the bike, the tyre is working good and he can ride as he wants until the end of the race, then we can say that China and Le Mans are typical races,´ stated Brivio.

`I´m very proud to achieve this in five races, as it really shows how Yamaha have been competitive every weekend. This is a great sign of the efforts of all the race department, who identified a problem and were able to fix it.´

Rossi has won in Mugello on Aprilia, Honda and Yamaha machinery, and can make it three tyre manufacturers to whom he has given an Italian win should he cross the line first at the Gran Premio d´Italia Alice. To add to his perfect four-stroke record at the track with Michelin and lower cylinder category Dunlop success, the five-time MotoGP World Champion now has the chance to give Bridgestone their first Mugello victory.

`It´s important for Valentino to win in Mugello, after six years of victories and a new tyre manufacturer. We hope that we can continue like we have been in the past five races,´ said Brivio

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Kawasaki `screamer´ engine development continues slowly

Although Olivier Jacque tested the Kawasaki `screamer´ engine again this week at Le Mans, it is still unclear whether the new motor will feature in a race in 2008.

Kawasaki´s test rider Olivier Jacque was a busy man on Monday at his home track, testing the Japanese company´s `screamer´ engine again and working on some chassis updates in order to assist John Hopkins and Anthony West to increase competitiveness.

Though Hopkins and West were both also present for testing, as they went in search of immediate improvements after another frustrating weekend which again yielded results below expectations in France, Jacque´s focus is on longer-term development, in particular with the much-talked-about `screamer´ engine.

The new motor has been run at tests in Malaysia and Jerez already this year, with Hopkins himself giving it a ride in Spain, and Jacque provided motogp.com with his latest thoughts on the project at Le Mans, saying, `We have been testing the screamer engine again and I think everybody heard the sound! It was quite good, but of course we are still just working on it. We got a lot of information about it.´

When pressed on whether he foresees the engine becoming competitive enough to use in races, Jacque answered, `Top end power is very good, and we are working on the speed. Corner exit speed needs to be good, quicker than the `big bang´, and at the moment that is quite critical, so we will try to work on the electronics. Every time we have a testing opportunity we try to understand how we can work with this type of engine.´

Meanwhile, Jacque´s test team crew chief Tom Jojic gave his viewpoint on the `screamer´ development, commenting, `There is potential there and Kawasaki are still trying to see if it is something that they could use. There are positives and negatives and we just keep trying new things. It is hard to say if we will see it in the near future, we will just stick to the test plan and see what we find.´

Giving an insight into how the agenda for test work is decided, Jojic added, `The race team lead the development. We support them by looking at everything they want us to test. They put in certain requests to try and make improvements. Kawasaki, KHI itself, also have certain things they want to try and they have got a development plan, so they ask us to test things. Usually the Japanese test team work on things first and if it gets past them then Olivier can relate more to what the race team needs.´

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