Ducati’s problems were exacerbated ten fold at Indianapolis and Alessandro Cicognani, Ducati Corse MotoGP Project Manager blames it all on the tires, while Jeremy Burgess, Valentino Rossi’s legendary crewchief previews the GP Aperol di San Marino e della Riviera di Rimini at the Misano World circuit, which is important race for the Italian team describing Rossi’s supposedly strong points on this particular track and one of the problems that they may encounter this upcoming weekend.

Rossi in his preview of the race looks like he’s already preparing his fans that Misano won’t be a breakthrough for him nor Ducati, while Nicky Hayden is worried about temperatures (Misano is expecting a high of 31°C on Sunday) because the higher the surface temperatures, the harder it is to ride the D16.

“We’ll be racing in front of our home fans at Misano, and obviously we’d like to do better than we have at recent races,” commented Valentino Rossi. “Indianapolis was very difficult, and we would have preferred to arrive here in better shape, but we’re aware that much of our work is aimed toward the future. For the moment, we must take into account the possibility that our results won’t be satisfying, first for us but also for our fans. We’re all working at our maximum, both at the track and in the company, and in the meantime, we’ll try to do as well as the current situation allows.”

“Indy was a bad race, but some how, some way, you’ve got to try to get over it and move on,” said Nicky Hayden. “Misano has been a tough track for me, because it seems like I can’t ever get through the first corner. It would be nice to catch a bit of a break, because I don’t feel like we’re always getting the results we deserve. We learned a lot about the new bike in Indy, so I hope we’ve got a good starting point there. We’ll see what the weather’s going to do. Hopefully it won’t be too hot, as that makes things more difficult for us. Anyway, we need to do our best and try to improve our bike.”

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Valentino Rossi will have to face this weekend’s Mugello GP be without his legendary crew chief Jeremy Burgess, as the Australian has flown home to be with his wife Claudine who has been diagnosed with a serious illness, and is undergoing tests and possible surgery in Australia.

‘The Godmaker’ as Motorcyclist called him, has helped Rossi win seven world titles, Mick Doohan five and Wayne Gardner one, will be temporarily replaced by Max Bartolini, Ducati’s technical manager, while Fabiano Sterlacchini from Pramac Ducati will fill in for Bartolini as Loris Capirossi will be missing his home race due to injuries sustained at Assen last weekend.

Burgess is expected to be back for the Sachsenring GP.

“First of all I’d like to wish good luck to Jeremy, who won’t be able to join us this weekend due to very important personal reasons,” said Rossi. “We’ll miss him very much in the garage, but we look forward to seeing him at the Sachsenring. In the meantime, we must try to do well at Mugello. We’ve ridden there with the GP12, but because our bike is an 800, it responds a little differently to adjustments, and it’s also in its first phase of development. It will be vital to quickly find the right path for the setup, as it’s important that we improve in every session in order to qualify in a good position. The track is one of my favorites, and I’ve always done pretty well there. Returning after last year’s accident is no problem for me, because I enjoyed riding there during the recent tests, as I always do. I hope there will be a big crowd and that I’ll be able to do better than we’ve managed until now, because this is a very important race.”

Rossi has won at the Mugello seven consecutive times from 2002 to 2008, taking a third spot in 2009 and last year missed the race after breaking his leg during Saturday morning practice, stopping his record of 230 GP starts.

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Jeremy Burgess in an exlusive interview with Enrico Borghi (who also co-authored Valentino Rossi autobiography “What if I had never tried it”) of Italy’s Motosprint magazine comes across as usual; pragmatic, calm and almost seraphic in the way he talks about his new, and what we consider exciting adventure in Ducati, after eons of working with Japanese manufacturers.

The interview was done during the week that Valentino Rossi’s crew spent in Borgo Panigale early last month, learning about all the inner workings of the Italian GP bike and how Ducati Corse’s racing department works.

Burgess highlights on some things we’ve already read around the internet, admitting that he too was slightly surprised about his rider’s test times at Valencia, but once again confirms it was Rossi’s injured shoulder that hindered the lap times and that the Italian was physically drained.

Continue reading: Jeremy Burgess: Ducati's new crewchief

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Current 2010 MotoGP champion Jorge Lorenzo has apparently asked for improvement to the Yamaha M1 engine, or things will be very difficult for the team next year. According to Valentino Rossi’s crew chief, Jeremy Burgess, departing with Rossi for Ducati, the M1 won’t be competitive next year without some significant changes.

According to what Lorenzo has said to Yamaha, the biggest update that needs to be made to the M1 is the acceleration, followed by rear tyre grip. Burgess says overall horsepower and acceleration needs to be improved in what will mark the last season of 800cc bikes for MotoGP, before they move to 1000cc from 2012.

In light of that, it will be interesting to see what Jorge Lorenzo and Yamaha can come up with in the coming year. Despite impressive performances from Lorenzo all year, Honda and Ducati were often hot on the heels of the Yamaha rider. With the departure of Valentino Rossi it will also be interesting to see whether the Yamaha team will be hurt by a lack of development expertise from its riders. Then there’s also Ben Spies to be reckoned with, so we’re expecting an interesting 2011 with the hope that the status quo might be shaken up a little.

Source | MCN

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One of the big questions that was left hanging yesterday after Ducati announced their not so secret two year deal with Valentino Rossi was whether Rossi would be bringing his legendary crewchief Jeremy Burgess and the rest of his Yamaha squad to Borgo Panigale

Ducati’s CEO Gabriele Del Torchio fended off the question with: “It is too early to say. At the moment we have finalised an agreement with him. Wait and see. It is mainly a decision that we will leave to Valentino.” however it seems that the famous crewchief is still pretty well undecided about his future.

Speaking to gpweek.com at Brno, Burgess candidly admitted, “I honestly don’t know yet” and added, “I don’t think I could commit for six more years, which would be needed. Perhaps I’ll go back to Australia and support a local young rider.”

Continue reading: Jeremy Burgess is he or isn't he going to Ducati?

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You’ve all been hearing the latest rumors that legendary crewchief Jeremy Burgess, will not be following Valentino Rossi in Ducati but he’s going to Honda to help fellow Australian Casey Stoner in his switch to the Japanese team.

Speaking with GP Week the Aussie laughed off the rumor with “Oh, it’s Honda this week? It was Ducati last week” and “there have been no formal discussions.” Apparently the hot rumor picked up steam when Shuei Nakamoto, HRC Vice President said that he’d hoped that once Valentino Rossi retired, his friend Burgess would consider returning to Honda.

Despite Burgess confirming his committment and loyalty to Yamaha, according to the commentators of Italia 1, who often have an inside line to Valentino Rossi’s entourage, reported during yesterday’s race at Laguna Seca, that Burgess will be almost a 100% heading to Ducati with his rider.

The Brno GP scheduled for August 15th should be day when Rossi announces his move to Ducati and we may also know who of his current team will be following him.

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World famous mechanic and Valentino Rossi’s crew chief has left a long interview with SuperBikePlanet in which he reveals many aspects of his long and rich career with riders like Wayne Gardner, Mick Doohan and Freddie Spencer. Jeremy Burgess discusses some fascinating moments of MotoGP history and the riders themselves. Some quotes from the interview, on being chief mechanic at Honda for Wayne Gardner:

“Honda, as a company, if they saw that you could offer more to them, or you had the potential to do more, if you didn’t do that, you weren’t doing the best for Honda. So it basically came down, when he explained it to me, “you don’t have a choice. You’re either going to be the chief mechanic for Wayne Gardner, or you’re shirking your issues.”

On the difference between Gardner and Doohan, Burgess says:

“To draw the parallel of him [Gardner] and Mick (Doohan), Wayne you would have to go and tell him that “you can beat those guys. You beat them last week. You can do it. You can do it. You can do it.”

Continue reading: Jeremy Burgess on everything: after working with Doohan, anyone's easy

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Speaking to the official MotoGP website at Estoril, legendary crewchief Jeremy Burgess said:

“When Valentino makes the decision that he no longer wants to continue racing that will be the point where I will make my own decision about what I do in the future. But as long as he is competitive he certainly will continue to race, I am sure of that. I am 56 years of age, so if Valentino does four more years I will be 60 and we could make a decision then.”

If anyone in the MotoGP paddock has heard these words from Burgess, there’s going to be a lot of groaning and swearing, because the Aussie crewchief, is one of the best – maybe even the best – at what he does. The combination Rossi/Burgess, with their deep and mutual admiration of each other, are always on the top of the game and it’s more than likely that this will continue until Rossi decides to say stop to motorcycle racing.

Many MotoGP wags were already seeing Rossi retiring at the end of 2010 when the Italian rider in a recent interview with MCN said:

“For me it is also important what Jerry thinks. I don’t know if Jerry wants to continue after next year. If Jerry says to me that he wants to stop, it is another story to continue without him and it would be a big question mark and very difficult. To restart with another chief mechanic after more than ten years would be very difficult and something I would have to consider a lot.”

but Burgess has set that record straight.

It also means that if Rossi wants to continue racing and truly be the GOAT and try to beat Giacomo Agostini’s win records, (officially 122, but Agostini says they’re 123) he’ll have his ‘Jerry’ with him, and if Valentino should decide to leave Yamaha as he has been hinting at lately, any other team who wants the 8 times World Champion will have to make room for Burgess, because Rossi will never part with his crewchief and winning team and that’s not going to be cheap in these economic times. Ducati and Honda are warned.

You can read the rest of the Burgess interview at the official website here.

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When Jeremy Burgess , legendary crew chief and mastermind behind the wins of World Champions Wayne Gardner, Mick Doohan and Valentino Rossi , decides to talk, everyone has the tendency to sit up and listen.

The quiet Australian has always been against the single tire rule saying that it would be bad for the championship and still continues to believe this. “To me its taking away the reason we go prototype racing, which is to improve bikes and technical partners and the engineering challenge which can make motorcycles better and safer in the future. It’s a disappointing decision given we are in prototype racing and we need a many technical contributors, so we can to differentiate ourselves from the World Superbike category.”

Burgess is also convinced that MotoGP spectacle will not improve now that everyone is on the same tires and that it will be even harder for top riders like Casey Stoner and Dani Pedrosa to defeat Valentino Rossi : “If I was a rider out there now I wouldn’t want to be on the same stuff as Valentino Rossi. That’s a tough call” He also added: “It was virtually a mono tyre several years ago without a regulation with Michelin in 500s and we saw some pretty uninteresting racing there with Mick (Doohan) clearing away and winning races. When it was Mick and Valentino in the past with everyone on the same brand, those guys did most of the winning, so nothing will change.”

Continue reading: Jeremy Burgess still against one tire rule

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Visordown.com and Jon Urry give us this great interview with Jeremy Burgess, who speaks of his history in motorcycling, including championships won with Mick Doohan and Valentino Rossi.

Burgess is a man who always sits in the background, but like many of this type, his important role is not to be underestimated, both for the team and the riders. Below we give you some extracts from the interview, but I’ll come out and say that for me the most fascinating part in his comparison of Rossi and Doohan.

So how did you get to being a crew chief?
I used to race. I worked on all of my own race bikes and I enjoyed that side of it very much. I spent many hours tinkering in the shed at night dreaming about going faster. I think it helped me a lot to get a job at Suzuki in 1980. Suzuki knew me from when I raced in Australia and I had an RG500, and mine was always fast and ran all weekend at race meetings.

Continue reading: Interview with Jeremy Burgess: Rossi vs Doohan and championship satisfaction

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