Valentino Rossi joining Yamaha for 2004


No more Honda

By Dan Moakes
November 12 2003

The rumours have been flying around for weeks now, culminating with World Champion Valentino Rossi parting company with Honda after the final race of 2003. Now the confirmation has been released - ‘the Doctor’ joins Yamaha for 2004. Rossi is to be Carlos Checa’s team-mate next year, in the first of two years with Yamaha and the YZR-M1. Marco Melandri will stay within the fold, but move from the Fortuna team to the Gauloises Tech 3 team. It’s thought that both Alex Barros and Olivier Jacque could both be moving on - with the Brazilian rumoured to be Rossi’s replacement at Repsol Honda.

In other news, Kawasaki have been speaking to Shin’ya Nakano, and he may be in contention to replace Garry McCoy. The other possibles for the second full-time ZX-RR seat - alongside Alex Hofmann - are Andrew Pitt and Eric Bostrom.

Meanwhile, Bridgestone have withdrawn their supply of Bridgestone tyres from Proton, but are thought to be in talks with Suzuki and/or Kawasaki. Makoto Tamada and Pramac Honda will stay with Bridgestone.

But the big question is whether Rossi will make the M1 into a regular winner, or has he gone in for too tough a task. Have your say on our message board.

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