folk starting to take the p--- now

[pitternator]

its my point exactly. Honda had quite a few lean years when they won zilch. Yet nobody said it was pedrosas fault...!! I think the whole issue comes down to what seems to be a very english concept of knocking winners....like the sneer at JT wimping out ( or indeed anyone quitting a sport after injury), hence doohan and fogarty are therefore wimps eh ??
Come on FFS, lets get real and acknowledge ( like ralphie commented), that nobody can be at the top of their game for ever, and indeed racing is a fickle sport where success or failure is mere fractions of a second..
Meanwhile, going back to formula 1 as another analogy...I do wonder if Schumi might have taken that win in china if his stupid pitcrew had not left his wheel undone?....yet further proof of how the machine can limit or enhance the man !

[Phil]

  I think the whole issue comes down to what seems to be a very english concept of knocking winners.

I wasnt knocking Rossi in that sense.

I did have a chuckle when they said he had used Hayden's settings at Qatar as they were struggling with theirs. All this after the very public building of the wall in the Yamaha pits. If he wasn't so cocky then maybe people wouldn't have so much of a problem with him now. There was also the 'Stoner isnt trying' comments he made.

Going back to 2004 Rossi didnt pick the fastest engine, he picked the most user to match the user friendly handling Yamaha and relied on his skill to make the difference.
Sadly the Ducati isnt user friendly in its handling and thats his issue. I was hoping the softer construction tyres would help him out, I'd like to see Rossi back up at the front challenging for wins. I cant see that happening for a while under normal conditions.

Rossis skills are so extreme he has to have machinery to do the job, to match stoner ( who is probably the best current rider in the world)  on a slower bike is a big ask..

The Ducati isnt slow
http://resources.motogp.com/files/result...1_01cacdb9

and moved at the same time its become the best bike out there.Look at how easily he and pedrosa just wafted past everyone at quatar...lorenzo won by hanging on , 

Lorenzo beat Pedrosa though. Not just by hanging on either.

[pitternator]

oh but  yes he did...pedrosa overtook him easily on the straight, and lorenzo beat him back by sheer determination and " hanging on". He never gave up.IMO pedrosa should have won the race, but failed to capitalise on his advantage. In this race Lorenzo earned so much kudos over pedrosa, who clearly had the better machine.Certainly in my estimation he has grown leaps and bounds. Its so sad he was put out of the last races of last year by an INJURY.Or did he wimp out cos of an idsy bidsy finger injury ?? 
we need rossi ( and others) back at the front , its only lorenzo who is stopping the hondas making it all just a procession. :\

[mickdel]

Andy
ref Toselands injury ...I have posted b4 that I empathize with JT cos I had almost the same injury from a bike crash. Its actually an impossible injury to recover from. Full stop. End of story. So please just stop thinking JT somehow wimped out. His wrist injury is non operable, non recoverable.He , like me is living on borrowed time before his wrist will need a full fusion , at which point any sort of wrist movement is ceased = great difficulty in using the throttle.As  road rider thi swill create great difficulty in riding a bike, let alone race one.... It really makes me mad when people who know absolutely zilch about an injury profess wisdom on such ....JT was forced out , not wimped out.

I fully agree Pitt.  I bust my wrist in 92 - distal radial fracture or a "colles" fracture.  It was set, but I fell on it again, and it slightly moved and became unstable.  It had to be "broken" again, and reset.  It is mis-shapen compared to the right wrist, and is unstable when I put my full weight on it,  so when you've a wrist that moves around a bit,  you're never going to have full control when exerting maximum pressure on the joint - braking from 200mph plus could easily dislocate it,  and/or fracture again.    Wrists are very hard to heal because, my doc said,  the blood supply to the bones is very poor indeed.

[pitternator]

there is now another GP12 thread so some of this  may be double take, but I still maintain you cant compare hayden and rossi so simply...viz that rossi should be able to go faster on haydens settings. They are totally different riders....FFS cant anyone see how feckin desperate rossi is now to try anything to get the bike working how he wants it. IMO its  a total lost cause...because by now they would have found a solution if there was one to have . Realistically with all the talent , will and kudos rossi and his team have, if there was a solution, they would have had it by now.
By itself this failure must also be affecting rossi....that IMO much more than the broken leg, simos death....but totally there will be a psychological burden which few could keep composure under. If anything , I have admired rossi more now as a great , to put up with all the shite, and keep resolve.I do hope there will be a solution by 2013.
Contrast stoner who took a long period off racing when his mojo went when he was at ducati ...but rossi is a tryer, works by empirical methods, but surely now they must be exhausting possibilities.. :\

oh and when I said " faster" in earlier comments , it is lap times I am referring to...just how else are racers compared or  judged by ????  :rolleyes .. its all about lap times...consistency , just why rossi was nicknamed the doctor in the first place, his ability to keep producing the goods, consistently and clinically, his ability to judge and take  corners etc...its feck all to do with top speed down the main straight ...you win races by being able to lap vary fast consistently , time after time. Its maybe stoners greatest ability ...rather than his ability to actually overtake as such.Once he is in front , he dont  tend to put  a foot wrong. Put him in midfield and sometimes he struggles a bit to get through. But on the current honda... well I reckon he could qualify anywhere on the grid and do well...

mick
I suffered a colles fracture which is usually a straightforward jobbie to set ,but I also suffered a  dislocation of every ligament in my wrist.I remember the top of my wrist came up like  a balloon! I had it reset twice in 1 week just after the crash, but it was unstable, and 3 months on , I saw a hand specialist  who  put it to me bluntly,  " that wrist is buggered".....inoperable...but by great effort , prayer and good fortune the same surgeon a month later operated  put it all together again, rebroke my arm , fashioned a new radial styloid, rebuilt my scaphoid, held it all  in place by screws, and 6 yrs on in spite of so many opinions it would fail...its still working to 80 % of  normal flexibility. Luckily for me its my left wrist ,and I am right handed , but I know it all could fail very easily. I certainly cant go racing ...one bust and its all in pieces. I do actually think it is a miracle...sounds daft to most , but it is to me.It certainly changed my life and how I look on things...

[Phil]

Rossis skills are so extreme he has to have machinery to do the job, to match stoner ( who is probably the best current rider in the world)  on a slower bike is a big ask..

oh and when I said " faster" in earlier comments , it is lap times I am referring to...just how else are racers compared or  judged by ????  :rolleyes .. its all about lap times...consistency 
 

If Rossi beat Stoner then Rossi would have the faster bike  :\

[pitternator]

obviously !....but the difference in a set up can make  a massive difference for 2 riders on the same bike...

I think you need to contrast the performance of spies and lorenzo...supposedly on the same bike, yet one comes 2 nd the other comes 10th...if the set up dont suit the rider then he cant perform. Spies has shown he can race, either he or the bike are not in the zone .Yet after just 2 races this season there is already talk of him being replaced by Crutchlow ! Feck, its a competitive world...

[Skippernick]

pitternator can you write your responses a bit more concisely because i fall alseep half way through reading them, they're to long :pokefun