MotoGP 2014 Teams & Regulation Changes

For those of you who haven't caught up with the rule changes for this year, here is a brief overview:

The majority of technical regulations stay the same for 2014 with the exception of 3 restrictions. Factory bikes (Honda, Yamaha & Ducati) remain full prototype machines, still limited to 4 riders per manufacturer. Yamaha and Honda have both developed production bikes that comply with the new ‘open’ class regulations, these bikes can be hired by customer teams to complete under the new open regulations. The regulations also allow teams to develop their own bikes such as the PBM chassis'd Aprilia.

This table below explains the regulation differences between the classes.

	Electronics*	Engines	Fuel
Factory	Factory Software	5	20 litres
Open	Standardised	12	24 litres

*all bikes must run ECU Hardware provided by Magneti Marelli

It is still unknown whether Ducati will switch to their open bike for 2014, they have until the 28th February to decide. For now, here is a split of which teams & riders are running which bikes.

Factory Teams / Riders

Honda Racing Corp

Marc Marquez

Dani Pedrosa

Yamaha Factory

Jorge Lorenzo

Valentino Rossi

Ducati Factory

Cal Crutchlow

Andrea Dovisioso

GO&FUN Gresini Honda (Satellite)

Alvaro Bautista

LCR Honda (Satellite)

Stefan Bradl

Tech3 Yamaha (Satellite)

Bradley Smith

Pol Espagaro

Pramac Ducati Racing (Satellite)

Andrea Iannone

 ‘Open’ Teams / Riders

GO&FUN Gresini (Honda)

Scott Redding

Pramac Racing

Yonny Hernandez

Cardion AB Racing (Honda)

Karel Abraham

NGM Forward Racing (Yamaha)

Colin Edwards

Aleix Espagaro

Avintia Racing (Yamaha)

Hector Barbera

Mike Di Meglio

Drive M7 Aspar (Honda)

Hiroshi Aoyama

Nicky Hayden

Ioda Project Racing (Aprilia)

Leon Camier

Danilo Petrucci

PBM (Aprilia)

Broc Parkes

Michael Laverty

Marquez continues to lead - Espagaro fifth

Marquez ends day 2 heading up the timesheets once again by breaking the 2-Minute barrier, the only rider to do so this year.

Excluding Marquez there has been some serious movers further down, notably Aleix Espagaro. Building on a good day yesterday Espagargo posted a fastest time of 2:00.547, only 0.6s off Marquez's fastest. What was more impressive was the consistency of his lap times throughout the day, lapping several stints in the mid 2:00 minutes. He is certainly creating a great base to go forward into the final day tomorrow.

When dorna introduced the CRT class it seemed like it was just a grid filling exercise. They circulated at the back, hugely off the pace of the factory bikes and created their own little championship. Now with the current open class regulations it's evidently brought the two classes much closer together, so much so Ducati are considering moving over all together.

By the end of tomorrow we will have a much better idea of progress, but for now, it's looking promising for the open teams and not so good for the Factory Ducati's.

All of Fridays times can be found here:

http://resources.motogp.com/files/testresults/MotoGP_Test__Sepang_combined_sessions_2.pdf?version=1391595398

A Night at the Races - Arenacross 2014 - LG Arena

Coming from Weston super Mare the yearly beach race became a prominent part of wet autumn weekends and after moving away for university I've not returned in quite some time. After dragging the missus around the country and over to France for the Moto GP I thought I would take her to see something a bit different!

Firstly I'd like to say that it's great to see some big names (Garmin, Monster, Yamaha, Honda & Hyundai) supporting the resurgence of UK supercross, now dubbed Arenacross. The second notable mention was the arena and the track, a great layout accompanied by a freestyle ramp through the middle which had some real thought put into it, performing impeccably all night, showing very little degradation.

The night was split into essentially two parts. The qualifiers and the finals; these were were split up by the rookie, youth and freestyle sections. The action was fast paced and the evening very well run, it never felt like you were trying to fill the time between races with idle chat.

The first race atmosphere is remarkable, I don't think I have ever experienced anything like 10+ bikes hurtling across a dirt filled arena towards a very tight hairpin! What was probably more impressive was the 7-10 year olds on 65SW bike absolutely going for it!

What really topped off the night was the addition of freestyle sections, this was probably what impressed us the most and not really possible to put into words! Instead I will add the link to probably the most impressive sequence of the whole night.

So to round up, if you get the opportunity to go it's a great night out, 3 solid hours of adrenaline packed action for all the family!

3 Rounds remain, don't miss out!

BELFASTThe Odyssey ArenaJanuary 17 & 18

BIRMINGHAMThe LG ArenaJanuary 25

LIVERPOOLThe Echo ArenaFebruary 2

NEWCASTLEThe Metro ArenaFebruary 9

SHEFFIELDThe Motorpoint ArenaFebruary 15

LONDONWembley ArenaMarch 1

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