Soup :: Interview: Ducati's Claudio Domenicali

<A HREF="http://ad.doubleclick.net/jump/N3248.SuperbikePlanet.com/B2800708.3;abr=!ie4;abr=!ie5;sz=120x240;ord=< %= timeStamp% >?"> <IMG SRC="http://ad.doubleclick.net/ad/N3248.SuperbikePlanet.com/B2800708.3;abr=!ie4;abr=!ie5;sz=120x240;ord=< %= timeStamp% >?" BORDER=0 WIDTH=120 HEIGHT=240 ALT="Click Here"></A>

Interview: Ducati's Claudio Domenicali
by dean adams (thanks susan)
Monday, April 16, 2007

Ducati's Domenicali (right) and Maurizio Flammini (center) marvel at the amazingly lifelike features of one of Madame Tussaud's wax figures. Oh, wait, that's old man Zerbi. Sorry.
image by color matching is hard

After several years of sales doldrums brought on by the divisive 999, Ducati returned to its roots with the 1098 for 2007 and sales have exploded the world over. Ducati needed an increase in engine displacement on their flagship streetbike in order to stay competitive with their four-cylinder rivals on the sales floor. Now they say they need it in Superbike racing in order to stay competitive in production-based racing.

Ducati announced to the press last week that if they don't get a rules package that allows the 1098 to race in Superbike that they will leave the WSBK series at the end of the 2007 season.
In order to obtain Ducati's perspective in this matter, I interviewed Ducati Corse Managing Director Claudio Domenicali on Saturday via telephone.

Q. Claudio, what exactly is the situation regarding Ducati's 2008 World Superbike racing plans? It has been reported that Ducati will not be racing World Superbike next year unless the new capacity rules for Twins are adopted.

A. We wanted to make clear where everything started from, and the point that I stated is that everything started from the market, from us, and from the understanding that we needed to increase the capacity of our Twin to stay competitive on the market performance with the 1000cc four-cylinders from the Japanese. In the time, in the last five-six years, the performance of the Japanese bikes has increased a lot going to 1000, and we were lagging behind. It was one of the reasons—not the only one—but it was one of the reasons for us having a number of problems to face. So we started from when I took over in product development, and decided that we had to stick with a Twin, because this is our philosophy, and in order to have a Twin with performance which is similar to the 1000cc Four, we needed to increase in capacity. And so that was the main decision.

Starting from that, we then started to talk with the Federation and the organizers, in order to find possible balance, in order to have this bigger capacity, to race in a fair way against the four-cylinder engines. And the second point that, especially in the World Superbike Championship, not many people know that in the World Superbike Championship, there is actually two different sets of rules. Technical rules, I mean. One is for the Twin, and the other is for the Four. Not many people are aware of that.

Currently, the Twin is much more tuned than the Four. There is a higher degree of freedom, and this makes the current Twin, the 1000cc in race trim, still reasonably competitive with the Four. And what we are discussing and proposing is that we exchange that with the increase of capacity, and with the increase of capacity, we take the occasion to have the unique set of rules, having both the Four and the Twin with the same low level of tuning. In our opinion, a 1200cc Twin will be very similar in performance on the racetrack to a 1000cc Four, but if this is would not be the case, for whatever reason, we are already discussing with the Federation, we are available to talk about a performance handicap, either it is air restrictor or the weight. But we suggested that, and we are discussing, in order that the performance and the cap is kind of with an adjustable mechanism. In order that every three or four races, or whatever, with a mechanism which is agreed by everybody before starting, you can compare the performance, average performance, of the Twins, against the average performance of the Four, and if it's too much, you adjust the balance. In one direction or the other.

Because whatever balance you decide in the beginning, someone will not be happy. The Twin guy will scream because the handicap is too much. The Four guy will scream because the handicap is too less. So I think that one possible way is to start from a reasonable value and then every three races, to compare the performance average, and then if needed, to adjust with a mechanism which is agreed before. This would, in our opinion, should stop the polemic. Stop the polemic that the possible change of the rule is something done in favor of one maker, in favor of Ducati or whatever. Because if there is an agreed performance adjustment that can be adjusted every three races or so, even if the starting value of handicap is wrong, then the performance will be adjusted in some races, and so it will be a fair set of rules by working, by racing.

"... there is no way you can compete with the 1000cc Twin in stock form with a 1000cc Four if the circuit has some straights on it. You can be competitive if it's a very tight circuit, but in an open circuit, it's very difficult. That's because our bike suffered from something like 40 horsepower less in stock form."

Q Is there a deadline attached to this, as well? My understanding is that if new rules are not adopted by the end of May, then Ducati won't race WSBK in 2008.

A Everything in life has a deadline, eh? Especially when you talk about industry. So we cannot continue discussing after the end of May, because the end of May is the limit time frame in which we then have to commit much more seriously in what we already did to this new set of rules. Ordering the material for building the engine, ordering the material for assembling the bike, and so on. So far, we just made development. That means that we spent, anyway, some money, but it was not possible to get the possibility to race next year if we would not have taken at least to spend some money in development. But for giving you some reference, it's already since May 2005 we are discussing the possible change of rule for this new capacity bike. Because it's since then we have already taken the decision to grow the capacity of the Twin.

Q Can you see how difficult it might be for people to understand why you would need more capacity when Troy is dominating the way that he is in WSBK?

A Yeah. It's exactly the reason why we are trying to explain. The bike that Troy is using, it's the same capacity as the Four, but it's much more tuned. That's one point. Either you won't understand or not, this reality, this fact, that means that you have to re-vamp the engine much more often, and it's much more near to a MotoGP than a Superbike, which is out of the spirit of the rules.

The second point is that Troy is Troy. Troy is one guy that came in MotoGP for one race and has beaten all the other guys. If we look at the performance of the other guys with the Twin, they are very distant from what Troy is doing. Either last year and this year. The privateers racing with Ducati are less and less. And so, Troy is one thing, but I think that an honest guy should look at the average performance of the twin-cylinder guy, not just Troy.

Q In the interest of negotiating to find a solution, are you willing to make any concessions initially, such as if the FIM okayed 1200cc but required the Twin to carry more weight, or use a smaller fuel tank, or ...?

A We are available to give some concession in handicap, even if, on the technical side, we think there should be no need for that. And so we are anyway available for starting with a possible handicap, in weight or a possible handicap in air restrictor, provided that there is a system that if we end up with the average performance of the Four more than the average performance of the Twin, the handicap will survive through the races.

Q You must admit it was a leap of faith for you to build an 1100cc motorcycle when the rules did not support it at that time and still do not.

A I'm an optimistic guy, in one way, but on the other, when you are in trouble, there is ... the decisions are easier. And we were kind of desperate on the market, anyway. So we couldn't continue putting the race in front of the market. We are a company that we have racing as a very high priority, but we cannot use racing with higher priority than selling. And so we needed to have our sportsbike, which used to be the 999 and now we build the 1098, to be able to be taken in stock form on the racetrack, and compete side to side with the Japanese. That's very fair, no? And so there is no way you can compete with the 1000cc Twin in stock form with a 1000cc Four if the circuit has some straights on it. You can be competitive if it's a very tight circuit, but in an open circuit, it's very difficult. That's because our bike suffered from something like 40 horsepower less in stock form.

Q It seems to me that you're suffering from a PR problem, because it's not generally well-known that you're willing to lower the specification of the Superbike-spec Ducati in order to get more displacement. I think most people assume that Ducati want 1200cc and the same rules package that you have now. On the face of it, I don't see more displacement and a lower standard of tuning and the possibility of future performance handicapping being unreasonable.

A I think that you are completely right. This is why we are speaking to the press on this matter: because we want everyone to know Ducati's positon and that what we want isn't unreasonable, and is quite probably not what some people think that it is. We are very willing to make compromises to address any fears competitors or the federation have about this situation.

ENDS

Post this story to: digg

Return to News