Beefy's Corner - The Off-Topic Chat Thread

May seem dear, but you get to see Real Madrid. It could be a year or two before we meet them in the CL.

 

That's way over their ground capacity of 9,600 all seated. And £60 a ticket..? I think they were doing extremely well and they have a very promising future. It's a cheap shot you've taken and it doesn't fool anybody.

There are also only 3 permanent sides to the ground, so they can start to expand as soon as they like.

 

Not any more, they built a new stand.

 

That's what this whole game was for. The car-park has been moved so they could build the fourth stand.

The south stand will be known as 'The Ted McDougall' stand. Capacity is now 12,000, I believe.

 

You got me thinking about what is my favourite 'live' album TSS and I can't really look past Rust Never Sleeps by Neil Young and Crazy Horse...here's a sample

[video=youtube;ZVcDCAKCtMY]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVcDCAKCtMY[/video]

 

Well, Marquez just did Rossi around the outside at the corkscrew....TSS, discuss

 

Woah, cheers for the reminder! I forgot it had started!

 

Poor Bradl is getting hunted down like an animal here, really can't see Marquez letting him have this.

 

Sure enough, he's got him into the final corner....

 

Calm down, I wasn't trolling. The only team I troll is Man City. I wasn't being serious, it was more like um, irony. Or something. The irony of a Portsmouth fan criticising attendances. Thought you guys might appreciate the humour as I know attendances has been a hot topic in the past.

 

One of these is usually an indicator which helps to interpret irony.

 

Marc Marquez is now my pick for World Champion this year. I think he's a bloody phenomenon just like Valentino was when he blew the competition away early on in his career.

Laguna Seca result

1. Marquez
2. Bradl
3. Rossi

Stefan Bradl gets the first German podium in donkey's years.

 

Bit special is Marquez. Requisitely nuts too.

 

That does mean he seems to get into a few crashes though...

 

Quick little question for you MotoGP chaps, I've taken a casual interest in the last few races and I've noticed that pretty much all the bikes seem to be Hondas, Yamahas or Ducatis (not noticed any others), but they seem to be being referred to as teams within those groups, unless they are just referring to models or some such. So if I am correct in my assumption how many teams are there within each manufacturer, and how does that dynamic work with teams all under one umbrella? Are there kind of separate championships between riders, teams and manufacturers, or are the teams within each group entirely separate entities?

 

Like they were saying on the commentary earlier though...he really isn't crashing that much. I thought he'd be winning this year, but crashing his brains out every other round. So far he's proving me entirely wrong!

 

There is a factory team for each of the 3 manufacturers you mentioned, these teams run the latest prototype equipment and typically have the largest budgets. There are then satellite teams running close to factory bikes (quite often the previous years Factory bike) typically the factory teams will help them out to varying extents. There are also CRT teams who run bikes which are closer to what you might see in Superbike racing, the top CRT rider is recognised at each round although there is not a separate championship.

Suzuki and Kawasaki have had to pull Factory teams in recent years due to financial constraints, hopefully they will be back soon.

 

OK Mikey. A quick breakdown of MotoGP.
You have the factory teams [Honda, Yamaha, Ducati] and the satellite teams like LCR Honda, Tech3 Yamaha and Pramac Ducati. There are also a couple/few of other satellite teams running prototype MotoGP bikes. All of the above are prototype bikes with the very latest gear on the factory bikes and progressively less on the satellite bikes, depending on how well they are supported. Honda support their satellite teams very well. Yamaha and Ducati slightly less so.

Then we have the CRT teams. They run prototype framed and running gear but have extremely highly tuned stock engines, such as a Honda Fireblade or an Aprilia RSV4. They run about 20-40bhp down on the genuine prototype engines. Note no Kawasaki or Suzuki both of whom used to be in MotoGP. Suzuki are back in 2015.

That's the shortest, most informative summary I can do.

 

[edit] DT36 and TSS beat me to it, but I'll leave mine up here anyway

Well, there are "factory" teams, which are teams that receive direct help from the manufacturer. They're the ones you normally see at the front, although not always. Sometimes, you find "satellite" teams too. These are teams that run bikes similar to the factory teams, but perhaps don't receive any upgrades that the factory teams get until maybe a few races down the line. That's not to stop them from doing well, as Cal Crutchlow has proven this season on a satellite Yamaha.

The only three manufacturers represented in the series right now are Ducati, Yamaha and Ducati. Suzuki will be returning in 2015 though, and Aprilia are rumoured to be looking into a factory team too. However, on top of that, there are teams that run "CRT" bikes. This is based on allowing smaller teams to be competitive at a much cheaper rate, and whilst they may not be the fastest, they are proving to be a lot more competitive this year. They were brought in last year to boost grid numbers.

There are two championships I believe. One for the riders, and one for manufacturers.

Think that explains everything. Anything else you'd like to know?

 

Thanks guys, I feel thoroughly informed.

I like MotoGP thus far, never really gave it a chance because although I like the idea of motor racing and like bikes (My uncle has two Ducatis, he made quite sure I was aware of the benefits of two wheels rather than four!) and cars, I figured it would be like F1, i.e. takes bloody ages and not a great deal of action occurs so hard for a casual viewer to drop in to. It appears that is most definitely not the case!