Casey Stoner has made a return to the paddock. He turned up at the Algarve round of MotoGP for a number of media appointments, which included a press conference in which he discussed several fascinating subjects at length.
Although I will be posting the entire transcript at a later date, I want to highlight one or two of his statements to discuss.
Despite the fact that he hated talking to the media – we did not help him go any faster, so we were wasting his time – Stoner was always one of the best people to ask about technical aspects of riding, or machinery.
He had both a deep understanding of bikes and riding, and the eloquence and clarity of thought to be able to explain it deeply. It helped that English is his first language, of course (at least for those of us with the same mother tongue).
So it is worth highlighting some of the things Stoner talked about, and examining it a little closer. First up is something he said about adapting to the bike, rather than adapting the bike to you.