Brivio evaluates “dominant” Rossi era

Davide Brivio gave a positive report of the official MotoGP test at Brno which took place on Monday, and even though the day’s activities were cut short by rain the Team Manager for Valentino Rossi at Fiat Yamaha said that the rolling out of a new evolution of the M1 engine had proved positive.

“Yamaha will now prepare it to be used for the last race (of the season),” said Brivio in the attached video interview. “This test was also important to understand the problems we had in the race on Sunday, when we weren’t fast enough. We worked on a setting and we found something by the end of the morning, and this can be a good base for the next few races.”

The team had intended to further experiment with that setting as well as a new front tyre for Bridgestone, but the weather affected those plans. “It was not enough (time), but better than nothing because we needed to clear up what happened on Sunday,” added Brivio of the few hours on track.

The official news on Sunday of Rossi’s departure after seven seasons and four World Championships was also touched on by Brivio, who looked back memorably on the partnership without losing focus on the remainder of the 2010 campaign.

“It’s a pity Yamaha and Valentino will be separated next year but we still have eight races to go so we will try to do the best job we can, and to see if we can win some races in order to finish this fantastic relationship as best as possible. It’s sad, but that’s life!” said the Italian before continuing to discuss the magnitude of Rossi’s impact on the history of the Japanese factory.

“It was very important because when Valentino arrived in Yamaha we hadn’t scored any podiums in the factory team the season before, and suddenly we won the Championship in 2004 at the first attempt,” he said. “We then won everything we could in 2005 so it was very important because he gave very good feedback to the engineers to help develop the bike, and of course the Yamaha engineers were very good at responding to his requests and at preparing the solutions for his problems.”

“It was especially fantastic at the beginning because it was a dramatic change from our performances. We didn’t win for 12 years and then suddenly with Valentino we became dominant in MotoGP.”