Remember last year; At Honda, we congratulated ourselves on having finally succeeded in cutting the wings that Ducati put on its fairings by deliberately orienting the regulations. At HRC, we loudly proclaimed the uselessness, for motorcycles in general, of this aerodynamic research. No motorcycle would be equipped with a spoiler on the street, but, on the other hand, all production engines had to watch their consumption. However, the same new regulations opened a new era which gave a second wind to the aerodynamic factor.
Of course, the fins are no more and we hear here and there that safety, whatever anyone says, has suffered. The MotoGP prototypes rear up more often and we only have to remember the behavior of the motorcycles at the end of the Mugello straight to congratulate the riders on their courage. But for all that, the fairings have not returned to the status quo ante. The path opened by Ducati has not been closed.
Now everything happens inside. It's more discreet, but it's also road legal. Production machines will benefit from it, which also means, in the long term, the Superbike... A collateral consequence of the latest rules which delights the Dorna technical man, Conrad Cecchinelli : “ This was not the desired effect initially, but it is positive. These new fairings can be used by a production machine which was impossible with the old and horrible fins ».
« I think we have found the right balance in keeping costs low and maintaining safety. We have not banned aerodynamics. We only made it clear that we did not want unlimited budgets and dangerous fairings. We certainly didn't ban the idea of research to gain more support ».
The fact remains that the Ducati deprived of fins has never been as efficient in its quest for a world title as this year. Furthermore, the debate seems closed among the reds who have abandoned a fairing called "hammer head", to concentrate on other subjects...
