Replacements for Valentino Rossi in Ducati for the next 2013 season – MotoGP Special
Ducati has recently announced that it will not be renewing the contract with Valentino Rossi for the upcoming 2013 season.
It can be deduced that the decision of Ducati will affect the performance of Nicky Hayden in the current 2012 season.
Nicky Hayden currently riding for team Ducati holds 7th position in the riders’ championship with 84 points in reply to the 82 of his teammate Rossi.
The former world champion has been unable to show impressive performance in team Ducati. In the last season, he could only attain 132 points in the championship and could only make up to 8th position.
History seemed to repeating itself in the first half the current season because he has been unable to make it to the podium ever in the current season.
The Qatar Grand Prix went normal for him he started the race at 5th position and finished it at 6th position.
In the Following Grand prix luck went at odds with him and he could not give impressive performance with his bike. He started the Spanish Grand Prix at 3rdposition and was only able to finish it at 8th position. It took around 46 minutes and 02.766 seconds
to finish the Grand Prix.
Results at the Portugal Grand Prix were even worse than the results at Spanish GP. The American rider was dropped to the 11th place after having 10th position at grid.
Same inconsistency continued in the remainder of the first half of the season. In some races, he was able to improve the race results from the qualifying position while in others he could not, but still he has not been able to make it to the podium, until
now.
At the Grand Prix of France, he improved his results by making it the 6th position after starting from 11th grid place.
In the Catalonia Grand Prix, his performance dropped to 9th place continuing to the same trend in later in the first of the current 2012 season.
Riders of Ducati have not been able to achieve among top riders. Whether it is some problem associated with the ride or is it just that the luck is unsupportive for the team however, Rossi was giving impressive performances when he was racing with team Yamaha
before signing a contract with Ducati.
In the next year, Rossi will again be riding with team Yamaha Factory with his teammate Jorge Lorenzo after a break of around two years.
Rossi’s unavailability will leave a place empty at Ducati. Ben Spies of team Yamaha is free until now in the next season. He has not yet announced the team which he will be joining in the next season.
The million-dollar question would be whether Ducati will come up with some new rider or will it look for some rider with an impressive past record, in the next season.
Considering the past disappointing performances of Ducati riders, it is expected that Ducati will try to target some leading championship positions, in the next season.
Therefore, it is expected that someone with impressive past record will be targeted because Hayden is also not giving convincing performances in the current season. However, it would be too early to pass any comment with certainty.
On the other hand, Yamaha can give a tough time to the rivals in the next season as old teammates get together. Although they have announced that have no issues now but in the past Rossi had an issue that he was not given the respect as he should have been
given, this factor can result in getting them into good competition which can either be constructive or destructive.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are solely of the writer’s and do not reflect bettor.com’s official editorial policy.
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