Surprised by Rossi's teammate?

[KC]

I have to admit I am honestly surprised that Honda chose to put American Nicky Hayden on the premiere bike along side champ Rossi. Hayden is fast, but sometimes crashes. He comes from the same racing pedigree as Garry McCoy, years of sliding big bore Hondas on mile dirt tracks and matured nicely in the AMA Superbike series. I don't know if he is ready for the World stage but I think he can compete. He obviously does not know the tracks as well as his teammate and will not be used to the cooler temperatures that he normally faced here in the US.

Nicky and Rossi should hit it off quite well. Both are about 3/4's nuts to race as hard as they do and it should be fun next year.

Look for lurid slides under braking and 100 foot long black stripes coming off the turns!

[wreckless]

they put nickey there so that rossi doesnt have a team mate that can out-do him. Colin Edwards deserved that seat far more than nickey ever did

[f1manoz]

I have to admit that I was surprise by the picking of Hayden to be beside Rossi, as along with everyone else I though Edwards was far more deserving. But if Hayden can take the fight to Rossi, then good luck to him. But I don't think it will happen this year...

[asha]

I agree with wreckless.

Hayden is going to be worse then terrible. Has he even raced in a world superbike?? as a wildcard?? He must've but did set the world on fire did he?

Abe doesn't get a full-time ride, but Nicky does?? The gods must be crazy!

[gomick]

nicky is 20/21 - has won ama supersport & superbike championships..... deserves his chance of a moto gp ride

[asha]

maybe.. (time will tell i guess)
But i think Edwards deserves a factory ride more!

[moto1]

If he does as well as Hopper they have got a bargain!
Edwards should have got the ride though.

[wreckless]

there is no way hayden deserved that seat. Doin some reading up it turns out that his recent test on his new machine it was the 1st time he had even used full wet tires!!!. Sure he may have the tallent but he should have at least started in a lower team instead of leapfrogging more experienced and proven riders. He doesnt know any of the tracks either

[BootsOntheSide]

I agree with wreckless, I'm sure he is a potential champion, but he ahs no chance of staying with Max, let alone Tino. He was competitve as a wildcard in WSB, but will that be enough?

[Arneal]

I am a big fan of Haydens, but I agree that he doesn't deserve to be on the top bike. Edwards, amoung others, is better qualified. I just hope this doesn't ruin Nicky's career because sometimes people are brought up to quickly and never recover from it.

I think he has the talent for it, but being thrown in the deep end of the pool right away is going to be very difficult for him.

[Gerrit]

The odd thing is that last year Dorna introduced a so-called superlicence as an absolute requirement for being allowed to compete in Moto GP: one had to have finished in the top 15 of 500/Moto GP in the previous two years, or in the top 3 of 250 or WSB. Several riders do definitely NOT meet any of those requirements: Hayden, Tamada, Hopkins to name but a few. Yet these three are accepted without any sign of protest, whereas several riders who DO meet Dorma's own requirements are sidelined: Abe and v.d. Goorbergh spring readily to mind. The whole thing is becoming a big farce- I for one hope Moto GP blows up, the sooner all this nonsense is put aside the better.

[gomick]

ama superbike champion..... probably knows how to ride a fast motorbike

[zork]

I dont think Hayden is that good, He was only just beating ZXR and GSX750 on the same bike as Edwards? If he is that good he would have blown them away big time

[gomick]

he won 9 out of 16 races

[Dani Filth]

that's not quite blowin...