Rossi Leaving Burgess Behind?
Valentino Rossi will travel to Sachsenring with the intention of riding in the Grand Prix of Germany. This will have to be approved by the Chief Medical Officer, but, after his strong test ride at Brno in the Czech Republic on Monday when he put in competitive times riding a Yamaha Italy Yamaha R1 Superbike on Pirelli tires, that should not be a problem.
Rossi will then decide after free practice on Friday afternoon if he will actually take part in the race or not. If he does not feel capable of riding the full 30-lap race distance in a competitive fashion he will withdraw from the event and his place will again be taken by veteran Yamaha factory tester Wataru Yoshikawa for the remainder of the weekend.
None of this was unexpected, but news published on Wednesday, July 14 in the Roman daily Romagna Oggi states, listing no sources, that Rossi will not be accompanied to Ducati by Australian Jeremy Burgess, his crew chief since his first year in 500 (2000) and the man who put together the technical crew that followed Rossi in his startling move from Honda to Yamaha in 2004.
The same daily also reports that current team director, Davide Brivio, will also not accompany Rossi.
If Burgess remains at Yamaha, what would his role be? Assuming Ramon Forcada continues with Jorge Lorenzo (both Spanish) and American Tom Houseworth continues with Ben Spies, who would replace Rossi, Burgess could take on a larger role, as, perhaps, Technical Director, overseeing both sides of what would probably no longer be a divided garage (unless Lorenzo insists on keeping the wall).
All reliable Italian sources continue to insist that Rossi has already reached an agreement with Ducati for 2011 and 2012 and the Romagna Oggi article reports that the Rossi-Ducati deal will be announced at the United States Grand Prix at Laguna Seca (July 23-25).
Honda HRC officials have admitted privately that letting Burgess and the technical crew leave with Rossi in 2003 was a big mistake. That year Burgess was willing and, in fact, wanted to stay with Honda, but only if he could work with Nicky Hayden. Honda at first said no, and then that they would think about it, but when they finally told the Australian that he could, in fact, take over as crew chief with the young American, he had already lost patience and signed to continue with Rossi.
Perhaps the Italian newspaper is correct, but until confirmed, we will wait to see two things: If Burgess does stay behind in Yamaha (or retires), and if, after so much talk, Rossi actually leaves Yamaha.
The Ducati technical team is overseen by the brilliant engineer Filippo Preziosi, but Rossi has never started a premier class race without having Burgess and the hand-picked technical crew in his corner.
I'm keeping everything crossed he stays rubber side down this weekend.
