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Colin Edwards

russ69 said:
He's living the dream........his SBK championship proved his talent.
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Talent in SBK doesn't matter when you're racing in MotoGP. Neil Hodgson has a SBK championship, results weren't seen in GP. Despite Colin's title, he hasn't won a single race in GP. I like Troy Bayliss, but despite his amazing SBK success, he didn't do a lot in GP either (but at least he did stand atop the podium). Success in one series doesn't mean you'll have it in another. We all know Colin has talent, nobody disputes that, but he doesn't get results in GP.

Giving him a free year to learn the tracks and not count 2003 on the Aprilia he has raced in GP for seven seasons, 121 starts, only 11 podiums, zero wins, average position of 7th. I like the guy, but he isn't getting race results despite being on good equipment. Is getting on the box once out of every 11 races good for the team? Less than twice a year?

Even with his lack of wins and podium finishes, he must be doing something good for them or else he'd be gone.
 
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TB won a MotoGP race!

Colin's one of me faves, but Troy & the Ducati 'deci ruled that particular day......
 
firstbuell said:
TB won a MotoGP race!

Colin's one of me faves, but Troy & the Ducati 'deci ruled that particular day......
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Yep, the last race of the 990's, IIRC. Sadly, earlier in his MotoGP career TB spent too much time on the ground. :(
 
JO EBRMC said:
I've repeated it often enough: the guy has one bad season and suddenly everyone thinks he washed up.
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No, it has little to do with just last season, although it WAS pretty bad for a former world champion. It's the sum total of his whole MotoGP career. He's never won a race. Only 11 podiums. Best championship result was 4th. I mean, for someone who won two WSBK titles in 3 years, this has to be pretty disappointing. He was simply DOMINANT in 2002. He hasn't carried that over to MotoGP at all.

Yeah, he's been on a satellite team the last few years. But isn't that in an of itself kind of a slap in the face for a two-time WSBK champion? I can see why Spies started out on Tech3 when he first came over last year. But he proved himself and is now on a factory ride.

So is this reflective of his (declining?) abilities, and Rossi, Lorenzo, Stoner and Pedrosa are really just that much better than everyone else?
 
rsrider said:
being on a satellite team, or second bike on a factory team means you aren't getting the top shelf stuff, that would include important things like parts and data (which includes mapping, and you will have absolutely nothing if you don't have that.
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This. Anyone paying attention at the end of the season notices that, when the factory finally trickles down the good parts to the satellite teams, the racing between the factory riders and the satellite riders tends to get a bit closer. Not making an excuse for Colin, but it's just a fact of GP racing.
rsrider said:
when he choked on the last corner at ASSEN against Nicky, I was a bit disappointed, he seemed to never have recovered from that mental error.
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That totally sucked.

Colin has more than a nice smile, personality, and low cost going for him. One thing that really helps teams out is that he doesn't crash as much as the other guys, even the "aliens"* That saves a lot of money over a race weekend, and over the season.


*enough with this alien crap. Rossi excluded, the other riders in the group have been inconsistent and have not lived up to the moniker. Lorenzo spent two years crashing before he finally started hooking up and getting on the box consistently. And he won when previous champs Rossi was out and Stoner was having front end problems. Pedrosa was supposed to be the up and coming rider, and he hasn't been Mr Consistency, either. Stoner crashed an assload on a satellite Honda, bithced a whole lot, and got on a Ducati, where he had the tires he wanted & had a team that wanted to develop a bike around him. I was really hopign thet Spies would shock us all and win like he did in SBK, but that didn't happen - be it due to equipment, new tracks, or stiffer competitoin. I'm not a Rossi fan by any stretch, but A guy that breaks his leg, doesn't get any points for how many races? and still finished third in the championship is the only guy you should be calling alien in my opinion. Until the rest of thes guys can stop crashing, and perform on less than perfect machinery, they're just really good riders.
 
nightrider said:
I'm not a Rossi fan by any stretch, but A guy that breaks his leg, doesn't get any points for how many races? and still finished third in the championship is the only guy you should be calling alien in my opinion.
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I am a Rossi fan--the guy can ride, plain and simple. Doesn't seem to matter the equipment, he wins on 500cc strokers, 990s, 800s, with or without electronic stability cra...er, control. He wins even when he's clearly down on hp, and he knows how to RACE (how many other guys can move up from a poor start position the way Rossi does?).

I think both Spies and Simoncelli will be worth watching this season, though. Spies is another one who can actually race, not just go fast.
 
I think it is funny to talk down what Spies has done in his first real year in GP. Stick up for Edwards for having a sattelite ride, but not Ben. His first year he had one pole and two podiums. At best, in his third year in GP, Colin only had three podiums and no start from pole. Rookie year out Spies finishes 6th in the championship while Colin is 11th and averages 7th. How was Spies not good enough for you in his rookie year? A pole and couple of podiums and finishing sixth overall. New tracks, new team, new bike. Spies didn't win, gee he must suck lol. In terms of GP accomplishments Ben is going to stomp all over Colin, but I wish them both the best for 2011.

Is it time to race yet?


Nightrider, you also went on to say how Colin doesn't crash out much while the others (Rossi excluded) do and are inconsistent. If that is the case, that should greatly help Colin, but yet he still can't win a race or get up at the front consistently. Why is that? May not crash out, but isn't fast enough to take advantage of the breaks that are offered.
 
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Obviously, Edwards has never set the racing world on fire since coming to MotoGP but looking at other WSBK riders who have made the switch, Edwards stands above them all. Just because he was dominant in his final year in superbikes isn't a reason to expect him to dominate in MotoGP. Even looking at all other riders, there aren't many who have been around as long and have nearly as high of an average finish.

He has had a respectable career in MotoGP and if it weren't for last season, we wouldn't even be having this conversation. Now, if he fails to finish ahead of Crutchlow this season, then the question is legitimate.


Cali said:
I think it is funny to talk down what Spies has done in his first real year in GP. Stick up for Edwards for having a sattelite ride, but not Ben.
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Who is talking down what Spies has done?
 
I think Colin's great and I think he deserves to be there. He's finishing ahead of lots of people who are supposedly the next great thing.

I think he make life easier on the new guys and I don't think that Ben would have done as well as he did without Colin as a teammate.

I think it's amusing that people with no inside information assume that Yamaha has their heads up their butts by keeping him on. That's just asinine. I also think it's amusing how many times this same conversation comes up. (Yet I always let myself comment.)
 
Cali said:
Sounds like he supports Edwards to an extent, but then:


Was he expecting Spies to take the title in his rookie year like SBK, on a sattelite bike?
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I don't really think that is talking down Spies, rather just an admission of unrealistic hopes.
 
Kootenanny said:
I am a Rossi fan--the guy can ride, plain and simple. Doesn't seem to matter the equipment, he wins on 500cc strokers, 990s, 800s, with or without electronic stability cra...er, control. He wins even when he's clearly down on hp, and he knows how to RACE (how many other guys can move up from a poor start position the way Rossi does?).

I think both Spies and Simoncelli will be worth watching this season, though. Spies is another one who can actually race, not just go fast.
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Everything you just said. Times 2. Those three are the main people I'm gonna root for. (and a little RdP!)
 
Kootenanny said:
I am a Rossi fan--the guy can ride, plain and simple. Doesn't seem to matter the equipment, he wins on 500cc strokers, 990s, 800s, with or without electronic stability cra...er, control. He wins even when he's clearly down on hp, and he knows how to RACE (how many other guys can move up from a poor start position the way Rossi does?).
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What an incredibly unique and interesting opinion. A Rossi fan? really?
 
JO EBRMC said:
He has had a respectable career in MotoGP and if it weren't for last season, we wouldn't even be having this conversation.
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No, I still might have brought it up. For the last two years of watching (not intently following) motorcycle racing, I've though Colin's performance has been kind of underwhelming. And then when I actually looked up his results, I was surprised that he's been on the podium so few times, and that he's never won a MotoGP race. And then to see how he killed WSBK in 2002, I had a hard time understanding what's happening.

I mean, look at Spies: won WSBK in '09, came to MotoGP last year, and on a completely new bike and mostly unfamiliar tracks STILL managed 6th in points. And that's on a satellite team. If he had gotten a factory ride right off the bat, might he have done even better?

In any case, given Colin's dominance in '02, for him to move to MotoGP and not accomplish a whole lot would seem to me to be rather disappointing.
 
DaveT319 said:
No, I still might have brought it up. For the last two years of watching (not intently following) motorcycle racing, I've though Colin's performance has been kind of underwhelming. And then when I actually looked up his results, I was surprised that he's been on the podium so few times, and that he's never won a MotoGP race. And then to see how he killed WSBK in 2002, I had a hard time understanding what's happening.

I mean, look at Spies: won WSBK in '09, came to MotoGP last year, and on a completely new bike and mostly unfamiliar tracks STILL managed 6th in points. And that's on a satellite team. If he had gotten a factory ride right off the bat, might he have done even better?

In any case, given Colin's dominance in '02, for him to move to MotoGP and not accomplish a whole lot would seem to me to be rather disappointing.
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Read over all of my post. Edwards has far and away the best performance of any WSBK rider in MotoGP. Spies is very likely to be an exception and I think we'd say the same about any rider who took the WSBK title in his rookie year (aside maybe from Poland who was in the very infancy of WSBK). Compare Edwards to anyone else and he is the best in MotoGP.

Disappointing? Compared to what? Bayliss? Byrne? Toseland? Perhaps your estimation of the talent pool in WSBK is inflated?
 
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