The Monster 2016 MotoGP Silly Season Primer, Part 2: Ducati in Search of an Alien

Though much of the attention during this year's Silly Season will be on the Yamaha and Honda garages, which we wrote about yesterday, the more interesting stories are to be found in the rest of pit lane. With Yamaha and Honda looking likely to remain virtually unchanged, the other factories in MotoGP could see a lot more changes.The garage likely to generate the most speculation is that of Ducati. Since the arrival of Gigi Dall'Igna as the head of Ducati Corse, the Ducati Desmosedici has been transformed from a career killer to championship contender. Or at least we believe it has: last year, the Andreas Dovizioso and Iannone grabbed eight podiums between them, and came close to a win at the first race in Qatar, Dovizioso coming up just 0.174 short of Valentino Rossi. The GP16 – or the Desmosedici GP, as Ducati have deigned to call it – is meant to be even more competitive, benefiting not only from a year of refinement, but also from experience with the spec Magneti Marelli electronics.Last year, at the launch of the GP15, Dall'Igna said the goal of Ducati was to win a race that year. They did not, but the overall competitiveness of the bike led many to question whether the problem might be the riders the factory team have. Both Dovizioso and Iannone come with impeccable pedigrees, both having won multiple Grand Prix, Dovizioso also having won a MotoGP race and a world championship in 125. Yet neither has managed to pose a consistent threat to the established hierarchy on the Desmosedici. They have been there or thereabouts, and sometimes looked seriously dangerous, as they both did at Qatar, and Iannone did at Phillip Island. But are they the right riders to mount a campaign for the 2016 MotoGP championship?read more