Motorsport - MotoGP in 2011 & The Need For Change

MotoGP in 2011 & The Need For Change

I got into motorbikes several years ago, and being an avid motorsport fan, inevitably I take an interest in bike racing. My motorsport interests start with Formula 1, for several reasons.

Firstly, as a form of prototype racing it’s considered the pinnacle of four wheel racing. And secondly, it’s by far the most accessible form of racing available.

MotoGP occupies a similar position within motorcycle racing. The bikes are absolute prototypes, bearing little resemblance to the bikes road users buy. As with Formula 1, the races are broadcast by terrestrial channels, making them convenient for viewers.

And like Formula 1, MotoGP has flaws. Prototype racing is notoriously expensive to enter and develop for, the machines has so little resemblance to road going or even homologated racing machines that every part has to be developed from scratch.

This is where the first problem arrises for MotoGP.

Casey Stoner's 2011 Honda RC212V

With a reported cost of around $46 million for a two bike team, with the bikes alone costing up to around $5 million, the rewards for the company competing have to be well worth the effort. And unfortunately it just isn’t. MotoGP just doesn’t have the financial rewards to make it worth developing for. The sign of this is the lack of privateer development in the sport.

MotoGP has a total of four bikes: The Honda RC212V, Yamaha YZR-M1, Ducati GP12 and the Suzuki GSV-R and the entire grid is made up of just 17 riders and 9 teams, four of which are factory teams.

Formula 1 on the other hand has 12 different cars, developed by 12 different teams, made up of a mix of house-hold names and self-sustaining privateers and 24 drivers.

The ‘satellite teams’ exist purely to race in MotoGP, there is none of the engineering development work that Formula 1 teams like Williams F1 and engine developers Cosworth are involved in. It means that MotoGP relies on MotoGP to bring in new money, new personnel and as it’s status as the premier form of motorcycle racing is eaten up by the advancement toward prototype racing by World Superbikes, MotoGP is struggling more and more to stay alive.

However, this is not really a problem. Prototype racing has been around as long as the respective machines have existed, Formula 1 has been a constructors championship since 1958! Indeed, Formula 1 teams enjoyed record pay outs in 2010, with the 12 teams earning a share of $685 million, the sport certainly isn’t lacking financial worth. And that’s due to being a sport that's pulling in viewers and fans. If the racing is exciting enough, people will go to watch it, buy the merchandise and pay to be involved in the sport.

And there lies MotoGP’s potentially fatal problem. The racing is not exciting.

Races generally start well, places juggling, some frankly brilliant and extremely brave overtaking manoeuvres being made for the first four or five laps, but then everything settles down and the race is more or less over aside from crashes.

This means the viewer experience is reduced to a background watch; the viewer doesn’t need to give the race their full attention, which in turn reduces the interest in it. The BBC coverage currently only covers a few minutes prior to race, the race itself and then the podium presentation. This meant the coverage of the Spanish GP at Catalunya was around 90 minutes long. Total.

In contrast the Formula 1 coverage of the Canadian GP ran for five hours and even switched channels, running from 5pm till gone 10pm, taking the full prime time slot for Sunday.

But why is this? What is it that Formula 1 is doing that MotoGP isn’t? To work that out you simply have to look back just a few years into Formula 1’s past. Prior to the introduction of the 2.4 litre V8 engines in 2006, the engines were 950 bhp V10’s. The power and performance these engines made the cars essentially undriveable. This meant the cars needed traction control and driver aids in order for the drivers simply to get the cars around a track without crashing at every corner, and in turn, the cars were equalled out and the demand on driver skill diminished.

Formula 1 needed to make changes. Viewer interest was falling, sponsors were concerned over the amount of money they were being asked to invest and manufacturers were debating whether the sport was worth competing in. Sounding familiar MotoGP fans?

The sport took drastic action, dumping the massive V10’s, much to the sadness and in some cases anger from fans, in favour of the smaller V8, cutting nearly 25% of the power, with the 2006 Williams developed just 740 bhp. As well this, in 2008, Traction Control was banned and a standardised ECU was created.

Formula 1 hasn’t been afraid to adopt changes and major shake-ups to increase the competitiveness of the cars. The speed and number of changes being pushed through are a subject of debate among fans, but the changes do have noticeable positive effects on the quality of racing.

The rest is mere history, the racing has generally got more and more exciting. The pinnacle of this advance is the fact that the 2011 Turkish Grand Prix set a new record for the number of overtakes in a single race. The sport has a healthy smattering of privateers competing along with big name manufacturers. Indeed, the current Constructers Champion is a privateer team, funded to a large extent by the Red Bull drinks company.

So what does MotoGP do? Well it currently has the problems Formula 1 had back in 2006, the engines are far too powerful and the bikes are almost impossible to control without substantial rider aids such as Traction Control and wheel spin detection. This is due to the bikes having a 240 bhp engine from an 800cc four cylinder engine.

That sounds pathetic compared to the 950 and 740 bhp figures Formula 1 sports, but then the cars must not weigh less than 640 kg, compared to the 150kg for a bike with a four cylinder engine.

Formula 1 realised being the most powerful racing cars did not make them the best, and now you get road going hyper cars which have much more than a Formula 1 car. MotoGP has yet to realise this, take the 1000cc road going sports bikes, with the most powerful of which, the 2011 Kawasaki ZX10R weighs in with around 197 bhp. That’s 40 bhp less while weighing a massive 50kg more! And this is  taking the most powerful 1000cc sportsbike, which are designed to be excellent track bikes themselves!

And if you compare with a road car... The 2005 VW Golf GTi, not a slow car and conveniently also with 197 bhp, but needs a 2000cc turbo charged engine to get it. With this much power and performance on tap, the bikes try to wheelie almost every time the rider goes near the throttle.

This brings up another, this time unique, problem for MotoGP in that the racing is so much more dangerous. Formula 1 has been on a totally purposeful drive towards complete safety, with the last death in the sport being Aryton Senna back in 1994. MotoGP on the other hand suffered it’s last death in 2003.

So what should MotoGP do? Well to start with, they need to make the bikes usable without too many rider aids. This means the rider has to be able to control wheel spin and the front wheel lift, in the exact same way a Formula 1 driver able control the wheel spin and over steer. The problem is that the manufacturers always find ways of keeping the power right up.

So the solution for MotoGP is to force the teams. This process is already in place, by forcing the teams to use just six engines per rider each season, so why no take this further. In fact, why not aid development of litre-class engines that kick out 197 bhp for example and still demand that a rider uses no more than six per season. Prototype racing should contribute to their respective road vehicles by creating new solutions.

Formula 1 has brought in a vast list of things that are great fuel saving measures; moveable/adjustable aerodynamics and a brake energy harvesting system used to supplement the engine for example are the main rule changes for the 2011 season, and what systems are being implemented on more and more road cars... So if MotoGP contributes to motorcycling in general, then it’s net worth increases and that will bring viewers and investors back to the sport.

The issue for motorcycles at the moment is that the relentless pursuit of power and performance has meant fuel economy has stagnated and a £10k car is often far more efficient than a £10k motorbike, negating the point of having a motorbike for a lot of riders.

So if the FIM (International Motorcycling Federation) demanded in the rules that the 1000cc engines that MotoGP will be using from the 2012 onwards had no more than 200 bhp, a rider used no more than six, or even less, per season and the bikes had to achieve a minimum season average fuel economy of say 45 miles per gallon, with the bikes still needing to touch 180/190 mph and adjusted the maximum allowed size of the fuel tanks to ensure this, the bikes would be far more controllable and useable for the poor sod who climbs on the thing and forces the manufacturers who produce the engines for racing and road going bikes to make ones that are capable of returning decent fuel economy, this mindset of fast AND efficient motorcycles will quickly filter down to the average rider, improving the whole of motorcycling, from the must humble 125cc scooters to the mind-numbingly fast sports bikes. And all of this will because the manufacturers were racing in MotoGP.

It’s not all bad news for MotoGP. The riders are undisputedly the best group of individuals to take to two wheels on a track, it’s not hard to appreciate the amount of skill involved in controlling 240bhp worth of motorcycle and achieving lean angles of 60⁰ requires not just jaw-dropping levels of skill but also an incredible amount of bravery as well. And with a strong collection of supremely talented rookies and young riders keeping the experienced old hands honest, MotoGP could have a very bright future indeed.

And while I’m well aware this isn’t easy, or cheap and it does shake up not only MotoGP, but the attitudes of sports bikes to the very core. The idea of reducing power for greater improvements in fuel economy would be considered obscene by the people who buy these bikes, but with the average age of the UK biker rising all the time and interest in MotoGP falling, it seems motorcycling is actually dying out before our eyes.

And if Formula 1 could transform itself from a massively expensive, scandal-filled collection of boring, processional races into the glittering, bright star of gloriously entertaining competition with the ability to recognise the need to contribute new technologies and financial responsibility, surely MotoGP can too, and give motorcycling a reason to keep the champagne flowing?

MD