[kropotkin thinks...] - Dorna Chief:"A Spec ECU Would Be Better, But It's Difficult"

[Ninjette Newsbot]

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Eighteen months after the MotoGP class reduced its capacity from 990 to 800cc, ostensibly in the name of safety, the number of worried faces at Dorna is increasing. It's been 29 races since a race was won thanks to a pass made on the last lap, and complaints have been growing that MotoGP has lost much of its former shine.

As always, whenever there's a problem, the search starts for a culprit - or at least a scapegoat - and the current favorite explanation is the growth in scope and power of electronics, with special scorn reserved for the role of traction control in MotoGP. The increased sophistication of electronics is almost universally blamed for the dearth of close racing over the past season and a half.

The complaints have Dorna rattled. Just how worried they are by this development was made clear by an interview which Dorna CEO Carmelo Ezpeleta had with Mela Chércoles of the Spanish sports' daily AS.com. Ezpeleta acknowledged that the racing had lost much of its excitement since the regulation changes, but said there was nothing he could do about it. "There's nothing we can do, because the five manufacturers have all agreed a common set of regulations," Ezpeleta told AS.com. The situation could not be solved in the same way that the tire regulations were dealt with at the end of last year, Ezpeleta said. "With the tires, I do not need to make any compromises, and could decide to go to a single tire make if I wanted to, but I cannot tell the bike manufacturers that all of the research and development they have done was for nothing."

Ezpeleta made no secret of his desire for a single, standardized engine management system, or ECU: "I would prefer to go to a single ECU if I could, but I need to get the agreement of the entire (MotoGP) world ... Ducati wouldn't want it, nor would any of the other manufacturers. The manufacturers are using the competitiveness of the series for their R&D efforts."

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