Capirossi claims rule changes are stifling Suzuki
Added on Friday, January 22nd, 2010 by Carole Nash Editor
Capirossi claims rule changes are stifling Suzuki
Loris Capirossi believes that new rule restrictions in MotoGP are making it impossible for Suzuki to close the gap on Yamaha, Honda and Ducati and believes that the team is facing an uphill battle to be competitive in 2010.
Suzuki haven’t had a Grand Prix win since Chris Vermeulen won in France in May 2007 and with new cost cutting restrictions curbing testing and limiting the number of engines to just six per season, Capirossi believes that even more baron seasons are in the pipeline for the Japanese manufacturer as long as the restrictions remain in place.
“You can’t test with the race riders, and the final straw is the absurd rule of six engines per season,” Capirossi told Italian website Motosprint. “How can you develop a new engine or something else new, if you have to comply with such a rule?
“We’ve had massive reliability problems already in the second half of 2009. So how can you develop an engine if it’s even sealed now? This is limiting for us.
“They are working like crazy in Japan, at Sepang we’ll have a prototype with many things, but we’ll have only six days of testing in order to select the right material.
“If by Qatar, in mid-March, we haven’t been able to make this selection, then that means we’ll have to keep, for the entire season, an unsorted bike that hasn’t been developed, and this is neither nice nor fair. In fact, it makes no sense.
“Once again, I blame the rule book, because it’s so wrong. The limits on sessions and engines are ruining this series badly.”
Capirossi does not believe the rules are achieving their aim of cutting costs either and has declared that he cannot wait for 1000cc bikes to be introduced to the sport, be that in 2011 or 2012.
“It’s true, the manufacturers wanted it, but they were wrong!” he added. “Sometimes you really can’t figure out what they want. This mess comes from the need to save money, but if you look carefully, you don’t save much. For example, why do customer bikes cost even more than they used to?”
“If the 1000cc bikes come back in 2011, and I think this is possible, then I’d be the happiest rider on Earth.”
