Reigning Moto2 World Champion Toni Elias will return to the big show for the 2011 season, as the Spanish rider has secured a contract with the LCR Honda satellite team. Elias has been on fire this season in Moto2, easily establishing himself as the dominate rider in the class. Looking to secure Moto2 as the feeder series for MotoGP, Dorna is rumored to have helped secure Elias’s return to premiere racing, after he lost his ride in the San Carlo Gresini Honda squad in 2009.
Noticeably absent from the silly season slogging has been the factory Suzuki MotoGP team. Although we know that Suzuki intends to stay in MotoGP for at least one more season, despite a continued tradition of mediocrity, very little other information has come forward. Perhaps at the top of the rumor heap is the speculation that Rizla Suzuki will potentially field only one bike in the 2011 MotoGP season, electing not to replace Loris Capirossi who has been linked to the Pramac Ducati team.
Toni Elias was banned from Free Practice 1 today at the Czech GP because he and his team, Gresini Racing, violated rules concerning when teams can test during the summer break. Holding a quick testing session at the Misano Circuit, Gresini and Elias were found to have broken the rules concerning testing, and were levied a €3,000 fine and banned from participating in today’s one-hour practice session. Gresini Racing opted not to appeal the ruling, saying they had not read the rules carefully enough regarding testing sessions. Whoops!
Along with the MotoGP and 125GP qualifying events, Qatar is playing host this weekend to the first running of the Moto2 race class, which is replacing the 250GP race action from this day forward. 41 riders were on hand for qualifying on Saturday, and despite the large field of entry, only 4.4 seconds separates all these racers (3.5 seconds if you drop Bernat Martinez and his last position Bimota). While the names may be unfamiliar, the racing is sure to be extremely close (we can’t even fathom what Turn 1 is going to look like).
Reports are coming in that Alex de Angelis will be headed to Scot Honda (thus ending any rumor that Toni Elias would be joining the satellite Honda team), and that Elias will be headed to Moto2 with the Sito Pons team. Kalex Engineering is expected to be providing Sito Pons with one of their Moto2 chassis solutions. You may remember Kalex from their gorgeous liter-bike track weapon we ran a couple months ago. While many are reporting these moves as fact, their appears to be some margin of uncertainty in the plan.
Well it’s official, Marco Melandri will join Marco Simoncelli at Team Marco Gresini Honda for the 2010 season. With Kawasaki out of MotoGP for 2010, the fact that Melandri would find roots elsewhere was assured. Melandri is no stranger to the Gresini team, during the 2005 season Marco joined Gresini on the Honda Telefonico Moviestar team, riding alongside Spaniard Sete Gibernau.
Big announcements came out of Brno this week, with the 2010 season starting to shape up with riders solidify positions for next year. With plenty of silly season ahead of us, we can at least reflect on the racing from the Czech Republic, which has once again shaped the MotoGP Championship standings.