MotoGP: Exclusive interview with Carlo Pernat – Audio also available

We had the pleasure of interviewing Carlo Pernat, one of the "gurus" of the world championship, who, having given up his role as Riders' Manager, moved to Team Pramac this year. Pernat answered questions about his new role, about Stoner's opponents in this 2012 world championship, about the Rossi Ducati crisis and about the future of the world championship which cannot be (in his opinion) linked to the CRTs. Below is the interview.

We are with Carlo Pernat, who this year, having given up his role as team manager of the riders, works for Team Pramac. What do you do for them Carlo?

“First of all it was a very painful choice, because frankly after the abandonment of Loris (Capirossi), abandonment in the sense that he stopped racing and unfortunately the death of Marco (Simoncelli) it is clear that the first desire was to stop, I say very sincerely; in fact I spent a few months dealing with Marco's foundation and so the idea was to let everything go a bit. Then many riders came forward and then Paolo Campinoti, owner of Pramac and friend for many years who offered me to be the sporting director of the team. In the end I would say that it was still the desire to be there and go back to the origins and be a sports director. Among other things, I also "kept" Alex De Angelis who I had had for years and frankly ending a relationship of this kind was not the case. It's clear that everything has changed a bit, but evidently it's more the desire to stay in this world, for 32 years now, than the desire to suddenly abandon an activity that is still my life."

After the first race in Losail, do you see a favorite for the title? Is Stoner still the favorite or do you think Lorenzo and Pedrosa can really undermine him?

“I saw all the tests in Sepang, Jerez, I saw the birth of these 1000s, Honda, Yamaha and Ducati. In my opinion the favorite is Lorenzo, I believe that at the moment he is the most complete rider, it doesn't mean the strongest, but complete from all points of view, in terms of talent, psychological, technical and character. Yamaha surprised me a lot, already since August when it showed up in Brno last season on Monday to test the new 1000 it made an excellent impression, it's a great bike, with an excellent engine, they've made a leap forward; the chassis as usual is one of their strong points, therefore a very very competitive bike and Jorge (Lorenzo) has a great desire to become world champion again, he has trained very well, he did some long runs during the winter tests, he has all the characteristics to be champion again, also keeping in mind that a little something has also changed in the tires because these new front tires which should already be ready in Jerez, are the ones that eight out of ten riders have approved, but two out of ten, combination those of the Honda (Stoner and Pedrosa) did not give a positive opinion; also because this new tire takes away the advantage that Honda had last year and the Honda riders know this and have caused a bit of "chaos", rightly so also because clearly everyone is looking out for their own interests. So Honda no longer has that advantage that it had last year, they also have some electronic problems. In my opinion, Stoner is still the fastest rider on the lap, he doesn't need many adjustments to the bike, he proved it with the Ducati, two clicks and off you go, but in my opinion the favorite is Lorenzo. "

We now come to the Rossi Ducati chapter. This year we expected not to fight for the title but to get at least close to the podium, but instead the situation is truly disastrous

“In my opinion there are two important points. The first concerns Ducati. It's clear that after having rebuilt a motorbike in two months you can't expect the moon. If I think about Honda, in the past since it made the 800cc, from 2007 onwards, it has never won apart from the last year, despite the means available and it made a lot of mistakes in the chassis. The first six months of every year was a disaster. Ducati has made a new frame and above all against its philosophy; it is the first time that Ducati has made a frame of this kind, so it must be given the appropriate mitigating circumstances because the culture of the cycling part does not belong to it, there has always been the culture of the engine, so it deserves some time given.

On the other hand, it must be said that Valentino (Rossi), I am completely convinced, that he can't digest this bike, hasn't digested it and will never digest it. The first day he got on it in Valencia he understood that this engine wasn't for him, he drives in a different way. He is certainly a champion, he is a legend, you can't say anything to someone who wins nine World Cups. But if you can't digest an engine, in my opinion you can do what you want but you don't drive like you know how. This happened, is happening and I'm afraid it will happen. There was this attempt to change everything to put it in a position to race but at the moment this engine doesn't drive it like it drove all the others, unfortunately Ducati has "ground down" so many riders. History teaches us, we need to go and see what happened behind it. In my opinion it is a marriage that will not go forward, this is my opinion as a manager. At least, if things go this way it makes no sense for either of us to continue.”

Does Rossi still have the possibility of racing for other official teams?

“I think that if Valentino had a bike that he likes he could still compete for the world championship, I'm not saying win it like before because Stoner, Lorenzo, the youngsters have grown up and psychologically have taken a step forward, they know they can beat Valentino, they would be great Beautiful prizes because Valentino still gives us "his". My opinion is that at the end of the year Valentino could also emigrate to other sports. You know, when you have a past where you argue with Honda, with Yamaha we know what happened, it's not easy to go back, you can't find fertile ground or at least it's very difficult. Then I believe that Carmelo Ezpeleta (CEO Dorna) has the ball in his hand, because he realizes that if by chance Rossi were to leave the world championship it would be a hard blow both from a media and business point of view . I am convinced that he will do everything to find solutions. Surely he has already asked himself this problem and he will already be looking for solutions. We can have this discussion in four/five Grands Prix."

Speaking of Ezpeleta, he focuses a lot on these new CRTs, do you think they have a future?

“Frankly, I believe very little in these CRTs. We are holding a world prototype championship where there are few prototypes. Both in Moto3, in Moto2 and in these CRTs. So it's already a technical "argument". I believe that Carmelo Ezpeleta used it a lot as a decoy or as a "blackmail" for the companies that had made the leasing of two motorbikes plus spare parts reach very high costs, especially in this current economic situation and also in the future one. He is trying to get manufacturers to lease previous year's bikes with new electronics for a maximum of 1 million euros. If this happens, my impression is that the starting grid will be quite good and therefore there will be no need for CRT, also because now there is a need to make regulations. If the regulations are not made today, the future is unknown, we need clear regulations so that manufacturers like Aprilia, BMW, Kawasaki, Suzuki can enter or re-enter with certain rules. On the other hand, it's not even fair, not that I want to be the champion of the company, I also "fired" on costs, but today you can't even afford them (Honda, Yamaha, Ducati) spending 10/12 million euros of development to accept "special" regulations that allow, for example, Aprilia and BMW to get closer to the top by spending 150.000 euros; this is not good either from a financial or regulatory point of view. I repeat, today we need a serious regulation made for three years."

We thank you Carlo for the interview granted and we wish you the best of luck in your new adventure.

“Thank you, greetings to everyone”

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