I interviewed Ducati Corse CEO Claudio Domenicali last week. Here's the transcript of the interview.

Q. Were you surprised at how much success the Ducati MotoGP team had in its first season?

A. We were surprised. The performance of the Ducati was good and we knew that we were designing our first GP bike, but that many of our competitors had much more experience. Thus, we were not expecting to be so good so fast.

Q. Was this the hardest year of your professional life?

A. Definitely, yes. It was more pressure than ever, because this year for us it was just incredible. Because after eight years we changed the Superbike to a completely new bike, meanwhile we designed and developed a new bike and new engine (GP bikes). If you sit and think about the man hours needed to put two projects like that on the plate and make them both a success, it's incredible. The Desmodedici was very good and the 999 was in a battle with the 998s which were very good as well. The 998 was a big animal to beat because it was very well developed. It was not automatic to be the fastest bike.

When we built the 916, for the very first half of the season it was not quicker than the old 888.

Q. But in MotoGP, did you expect to be so much faster than the Kawasaki, the Suzuki and the Yamaha?

A. Let's say, some of them, yes. But not the Yamaha. We had a lot to learn with the new bike and a lot to learn with the circuits because many of these tracks were new to us. We also had never arced a prototype bike; we had much more experience in tuning a production bike than in working with full-freedom. Our experience was always with Superbike tracks, which in many many cases are completely different than GP tracks. Setting up the GP bike on the new circuits posed a big challenge for us, very difficult.

Q. Before the Ducati GP project, how a factory went GP racing was with untold amounts of cash and men. Do you think Ducati has changed that perception with your minimalist approach to GP racing?

A. Well, I think we did our homework, you know? But I think we must pay respect to every competitor because each one is trying to do their best. I think we were just more on the point from the beginning; we made good decisions in packaging and layout and in the general compromise you need to have when you build a new bike. It seems to be working.

To do this you don't really need a great deal of (men or money), you just need to have a very clear idea what you need to build a fighting machine.

Q. There were two chassis changes to the MotoGP bike this year. Were there any major engine changes?

A. No, just constant detail work. That was crucial in keeping the engine running, you know? When you build a platform like that, which is so extreme in one way, it can suffer from a lot of tiny problems. We kept looking at that very carefully and have been solving many of the problems as we raced. It was a lot like trying to change the engine in a plane while the plane was flying.

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