Bridgestone hint at extended MotoGP deal
Added on Wednesday, April 14th, 2010 by Carole Nash Editor
Bridgestone hint at extended MotoGP deal
Bridgestone has hinted that it would be interested in extending its contract to supply tyres to the MotoGP championship beyond 2011.
The Japanese supplier, which became the sole supplier of the championship last season following the withdrawal of Michelin, has a contract to supply tyres to all of the championship teams until the end of the 2011 season.
There were fears however that the company were seeking to cut their involvement in motorsport following an announcement earlier in the year that they would not be renewing a similar agreement with the Formula One championship, which concludes at the end of this season.
However, Bridgestone’s motorcycle racing tyre development boss Hiroshi Yamada has suggested that the company is considering an extension for at least one year with a view to a possible longer term deal.
“Our contract expires at the end of 2011,” he told Motosprint. “I’ve been thinking about this for a while, I’d like to negotiate at least for 2012.”
“We haven’t taken a decision yet – the financial situation is still bad, but I think we’ll carry on and at the moment I’m trying to convince the top management that we should stay.”
Yamada did however suggest that he would like to see other tyre manufacturers competing in the championship, claiming that new restrictions on tyre use make it more feasible for other suppliers to enter the sport.
“From a sport’s point of view I think it’s shown its validity, because the tyre factor was too important before,” he said of the control tyre rule. “It’s better for the riders now.
“But personally I see sport as a confrontation, so this aspect has gone missing. I used to enjoy working to win by beating the others, while now we win by beating no one.”
“Anyone who wants to participate would be welcome for me. Obviously we’d have to keep the current rules, because they allow us to keep costs under control. The supply would have to remain unchanged: 18 tyres per rider per weekend and a limited number of tyres in winter testing. Going back to the situation we reached in 2008 would be unthinkable.”
He also acknowledged that Bridgestone’s departure from F1 could free up money for its MotoGP programme, but admitted he would prefer to see Bridgestone staying in both championships.
“Obviously we’d have more money to spend, because the F1 budget is very high, but in my opinion we should stay in F1 too, because our image would lose a lot otherwise,” he claimed.
