Kawasaki will announce it is to pull out of MotoGP on Thursday morning, leaving John Hopkins and the seemingly luckless Marco Melandri looking for a ride in 2009.
Although it isn’t yet known why the firm is withdrawing, the global economic crisis must be more than a factor, especially given the boss of Suzuki has hinted today the firm is in trouble and could be for sale.
Despite the fact Kawasaki Heavy Industries is a massive company, it has never spent anything like the money Honda has on racing and because Japan’s economy is in dire straits, non-essential activities are bound to be the first things to go.
This leaves MotoGP with only 17 riders on the grid for next year
:(fair enough the global credit crunch is on, but this is bad news. 17 riders on the grid, it really is a shame that the field is getting smaller and smaller…
Was melandri the second rider this year? i thought that american hocking the ama rider was going to be riding for them? or did they have a third ride? its a shame, although they’ve not been competitive, they’re certainly a colourful team.
definatley a shame and to some extent i think its bad for their road bikes too?. moto gp technology and the testing of technology in moto gp has finally started to creep into the road bike market which is brilliant and its great to know that the tech on your bike was first introduced in race bikes…and if you look at some of the road racing, take the TT as an example, Farquhar did fairly well on the kwak this year, so it may also hurt them here too?whats the source?
Unfortunately this does look to be true.Never good to lose bikes from the grid, but especially hard for MotoGp when the grid is so small already.
Will be a tragedy if Suzuki pull out too (it’s rumoured the company may be up for sale)
At least we still have real racing with WSB - it’s been better than MotoGP for a number of years (although it’s a real kick in the nuts that Brands won’t have a WSB round this year - about the best attended WSB meeting of the year)
tis for sure a real shame…kawasaki have struggled with the big thumper bikes…but I think this new bike had real promise…tis a real shame…
they are for sure a massive company but at times like this companies will look at things by balance sheet and motoGp will be a very big minus…I expected this even before the credit crunch…
I’m sorry but I don’t see the reason for the sentimentality.
Kawa have been back in GPs for 6 or 7 seasons and in that time have made no progress at all. They have gone from one shed to another and another in true also ran style. I hope they will now be able to focus on WSB and at least try and get one category half right;)
I think its sad that there will be less competition. Im also a Kawasaki rider and it is always nice to back the underdog. Ive never been one to back the clear winner and prefer to see someone come from the back of the grid and improve well. This is something that Kawasaki have/had the power to do. Perhaps this leak of information will result in some sponsorship help that may change the nature of the announcement.
However all of this does indicate that Japan’s economy is just as affected as our own. In my opinion, this global lack of confidence has bred itself and boils down to people and their perceptions. It just confirms my opinion that a lot of people are sheep. “Sheep power” if you will
It’s not that fact that it’s Kawasaki, but rather that the grid is dwindling.
There need to be some fairly brutal cost-cutting measures to get the entries back up and improve the racing.
The last ‘privateer’ effort in MotoGP was the WCM - and they were outlawed originally.
The bikes sounded awesome, though.
I think DORNA needs to get out of it’s ivory tower and realise that they need this to be more accessible to smaller private teams rather than just works iron. When was the last time you saw a privateer on the podium of a premier class race?
Is this another quiz? We’ve been a bit short on quizzes this winter…I think it’s really bad for MotoGP to be so short of competitors, and I’d hate to see it die - WSB is very good, but the premier class shouldn’t be production based…F1 would be very poor if they were all parading round in Mondeos wouldn’t it…
