Hunting Season Is Open.

So the first big announcement regarding the 2015 season has been made, and surprise, surprise, Honda Racing Corporation has re-signed Marc Marquez to their MotoGP factory team for 2015-16.  Marquez stormed the World Championship at his first attempt, grinning the whole way like a kid on Christmas morning.  Interestingly, when making the announcement HRC made no mention of Marquez’s teammate, Dani Pedrosa.

This is Pedrosa’s 9^th year with Honda’s factory squad, and while he’s certainly won a lot of races and contended for championships, in that time three of his four teammates have been crowned world champion.  So without championship success in all these years, has Pedrosa’s place at HRC become untenable?  Not necessarily, but the fact that HRC have left a question mark, whether deliberately or not, over his 2015 is telling.  There’s no question he’s a talented rider, but what is it that he and he alone can bring to the table?

When such questions are raised about someone of Pedrosa’s standing in the paddock the answer is usually ‘experience and developmental skills’.  He has both in spades, there’s no doubt.  But let’s not forget that HRC have a certain multiple World Champion Casey Stoner in their back pocket as a test rider.  Suddenly Dani’s claim to his place at HRC doesn’t seem so strong.

Much of this would be moot were it not for the fact that there are more riders than usual out of contract at the end of this season, including one Jorge Lorenzo.  Yamaha rider Lorenzo was Marquez’s closest challenger last year, and were it not for a severe collarbone injury early in the season quite probably would have prevented the young scamp from taking home the silverware.  Lorenzo’s 4^th place finish at Assen, with said broken collarbone, showed just how much fight is in him, and how much he wants a third premier class title.

It’s no secret that Lorenzo and his teammate Valentino Rossi feel that their Yamahas are lacking when compared with the Hondas, and Lorenzo would be remiss not to eye the second spot at HRC as a way to level the playing field against Marquez.  Rossi, although also out of contract, likely won’t – the veteran burned that bridge back in 2003 when he defected in the other direction.

There are others vying for the place of course – German Stephan Bradl is signed with Honda already through to the end of 2015, albeit currently as a satellite rider.  That could easily be amended – there’s also Spaniard Alvaro Bautista, another satellite rider, as well as several promising youngsters on Open class machinery.

But let’s say HRC’s line up in 2015 is Marquez and Lorenzo?  Who take’s Jorge’s place at Yamaha?  Briton Bradley Smith is out of contract at Tech3 at the end of this year, and has been making a strong case by posting some impressive results on his satellite Yamaha.  There’s also Aleix Espargaro, older brother of Smith’s Tech3 teammate Pol, who’s been leading the Open class, and giving slower Factory riders a bloody noses week in, week out.

All of these possibilities, and we still haven’t even considered the talent lurking in Moto2, just waiting for their chance to jump ship… suffice to say that with a 5 minute mid-week press release, HRC has kicked off silly season much, much earlier than usual.