Montesa/Honda future?

[matteo]

So, with Alfredo Gomez not getting Montesa bikes for 2012 (p*** poor timing for Alfredo), Fabio Lenzi leaving the Future Montesa team and Laia Sanz, now on the Gas Gas, how long before, either Honda pull the plug on Montesa, or show continued interest in motorcycle trials with the launch of a new bike.

Personally I'd like to see Honda continue, (I love my 4RT) In my personal opinion, they should ditch the Montesa name and sell the new bike as a Honda RTL, because thats what effectively they have been and would be (Its not like Honda dont have any history or success in trials is it). I dont think they would, as the name doesnt really make that much difference, we all know there Hondas in all but name. Toni would no doubt still win many more WTC on it, question is, will 2012 be Do or Die?

Do,

I hope so,

for the little (relatively low cost) of 2 x world championships per year, company prestige and for all of us Honda fans. I would imagine Repsol money is keeping the team going and let's face it, they only really need one world champion.

I fear this may not be the case though (history is repeating itself :0( and Honda is getting back into F1) ironically, the 4RT is quite popular where I ride, I know of 7 being bought in the last couple of months and good used ones are like rocking horse s**t.

Having just read through all of this , excuse me for a late reply to the topic but, to the original post here I think these are only normal questions many of us may have wondered about with the timing of the above riders switching brands. I believe though Laia Sanz left because she wanted to race Dakar and other off-road events and took a great deal from doble G and it was a difficult decision for her to leave.

As for the name though I would disagree to change it to Honda. The name is still on the cases and of course thanks to Honda the brand didn't die off in 84 but there is still the collaboration with Honda and the Montesa racing dept, that is very important, and the misunderstanding about how much work, and R&D is done in Spain with the bike. There are still those that think the bikes are made in Japan and sent over to Spain when it is the opposite, the RTLs have their own production run and sent to Japan. The only real works HRC bikes are those of Bou and Fuji, the rest are production bikes tricked out at the racing dept. in Spain. Being there in 04 and seeing everything first hand I would never want to see the Montesa name go away.

I don't think there were ever that many leftovers, it probably started off at the right number then grew like a fish story each time told to the next person! I thought it was close to 500 or so, but they were all gone last year. The reason they were leftover though besides not really changing much is the price never really came down, they are expensive to make and that type of fuel injection adds a lot of money to the cost of the bike, but they needed to discount them more so than did. The new bikes need to be less than what they are going for in order to really compete and get more out there. Pidcocks though is doing great job with the different specials they have available though, montesa Honda should really take note of that, maybe they should have had them do the graphics for the new 12 standard 4rt!

I also don't think Honda will pull out of trials and there will be a new bike in a couple years, it is reported to be very important to the Japanese, not only Honda but Yamaha, that's why there is still the team over there with Kuroyama. I think they are still trying to figure out how to go about it (as is Yamaha still) and when, other factors like the economy, the surge back to the two-strokes after the initial rule to ban them from the sport was seen to be an unreasonable expectation, and a harm to the other factories.

What montesa and Honda really need to do is up the PR campaign which is and has been really non-existent. Let everyone know what is going on with the bike, just tell something other than being quiet. That just adds fuel to the fire when people start speculating. Also they need to do things like publicly thank Dougie for his years with them and the championships back when he left, explain things like why they had to let Gomez go (his salary he was still offered the bike from what learned), just a nice thought out press release or something.

Tranquillo Caballeros

[nigel dabster]

You know all that from Verndon? Good going matt!

[matteo]

thanks mi viejo amigo, well sort of!