MotoGP News
Date: 10/August/2012
Valentino Rossi’s dream of winning the MotoGP title for home Italian manufacturer Ducati is over.
A winner of 79 MotoGP races and seven titles, Rossi has scored just two podiums since joining Ducati at the start of 2011.
Ducati is rumoured to have offered huge financial incentives to try and retain Rossi, but his priority was a competitive bike and a return to Yamaha alongside Jorge Lorenzo has now been officially confirmed.
Lin Jarvis, Managing Director of Yamaha Motor Racing, said: “In June we were able to sign Jorge Lorenzo for the 2013-14 campaign and now we are able to confirm Valentino Rossi for the next two years. In doing so we have been able to put together the strongest possible team to challenge for victories and to promote the Yamaha brand.
“We have run this ‘super team’ together in 2008, 2009 and 2010 and during that time we achieved the ‘triple crown’ titles with Rider, Manufacturer and Team World Championship victories for three consecutive years.
“The target for the future is obvious and we will do our utmost to achieve our goals.”
Rossi brought Yamaha instant MotoGP success when he made the brave decision to quit Honda, as the reigning triple world champion, at the end of 2003.
Yamaha had taken just one podium the season before Rossi’s arrival, but the Italian won his very first race on the M1 and finished the season as Yamaha’s first world champion since Wayne Rainey in 1992.
More titles followed, in 2005, 2008 and 2009, but the arrival of rising star Lorenzo in 2008 had upset Rossi, who felt let down by Yamaha. Lorenzo grew ever stronger and was leading Rossi in the 2010 championship when the Italian broke his leg at round four (Mugello).
Later that summer, Rossi delighted Italy by signing for Ducati - which had won the 2007 world title with Casey Stoner and was seeking a replacement for the Honda-bound Australian.
Despite Stoner’s success, the post-2006 Desmosedici was a ‘hard-to-please’ machine, with talented riders such as Marco Melandri stumped by its handling characteristics.
Rossi and his team of loyal mechanics remained confident they could ‘crack’ the Ducati, but have made virtually no tangible progress despite extensive technical changes.
Rossi is just eighth in this year’s world championship and, at 33 years old, seems to have decided he can’t wait any longer for Ducati to provide the kind of bike he needs.
“Ducati wishes [Rossi] well for the new challenges that await him, and in the meantime, the team will continue to give its best effort in order to improve over the latter part of the season,” said a Ducati statement.
Ducati has already re-signed Nicky Hayden for 2013, but has no options available in terms of replacing Rossi with a multiple MotoGP race winner. The leading candidates to replace Rossi are Yamaha Tech 3 team-mates Andrea Dovizioso and Cal Crutchlow.
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