The two races since my last column have seen the MotoGP World Championship title chase swing hugely in favour of Valentino Rossi, who now holds a 75-point lead over Casey Stoner with just five races remaining. It’s not over yet but it would take a miracle for Stoner to turn the situation around after three confidence-sapping crashes in the last three rounds.

Casey’s success over the past two seasons has been fruit of a lot of hard work and an incredible approach to a race weekend. He usually takes just three or four laps to get up to speed in the opening free practice and does not back off until he sees that chequered flag on a Sunday afternoon. That style comes naturally to Casey and I remember his old team boss Lucio Cecchinello trying to curb it when he was riding the privateer Honda on Michelin tyres in his rookie season.

With a competitive package, which is what he now has with Ducati and Bridgestone, it is a tactic that can be used to give valuable data to his engineers over as many practice laps as possible but also to demoralise his rivals. When people see a red helmet next to his name on the timing screen they are blown away by his pace, although to him it is just another personal best. Nobody could argue that it hasn’t worked for him because, at the end of the day, he is the reigning World Champion.

However, the problem with Casey’s approach is that by being on the limit all weekend he doesn’t have anywhere else to go. Rossi, on the other hand, pushes himself to the limit only once or twice in a weekend – and one of those is in the race. Last year, even though we saw some good races, Valentino wasn’t able to put Casey’s tactics to the test by consistently challenging him and putting him under pressure. This year he’s been able to do that and we are seeing the chinks in the armour of the Australian.

Personally at Misano and Brno I would like to have seen him back off, see what Valentino had to offer and go to battle. Instead he put himself under pressure by trying to raise the bar and pushing too hard and now Rossi has become a fly in the ointment for him. But the attraction of this kid is that he doesn’t understand the meaning of the word ‘slow’ and he is never prepared to accept second place. Neither is Valentino, which will ensure entertainment right to the end of the season regardless of the outcome of the championship.

Dani Pedrosa’s title chances ended with his crash at Sachsenring but any lingering hopes were extinguished by two disastrous races for Michelin at Laguna and Brno, which led to the surprise decision by HRC to give him Bridgestone tyres for the rest of the season. It’s an unbelievable move and it shows how many people are working for Pedrosa behind the scenes when he can demand something even Valentino couldn’t get his hands on at the same time last year. For Dani to get Bridgestones but not his team-mate Nicky Hayden, or even Rossi’s current team-mate Jorge Lorenzo, is quite stunning. I guess HRC are putting all their eggs in one basket because they know Nicky is going to Ducati and they want to get some data together so that they can come out swinging in 2009.

I suppose the good thing for Michelin is that Dani wasn’t doing them any favours with his comments in the press or his recent performances on the track so now they are free of him and can concentrate their focus on their remaining six riders over the final five races. Unfortunately it now seems unlikely that they will be providing tyres for any of the factory teams in 2009, unless there is a single tyre rule – which would allow them to outbid Bridgestone and supply all of the tyres on the grid.

Personally I want Michelin to stay now just as much as I wanted Bridgestone to come in a few years ago. I remember how exciting it was when Makoto Tamada scored his first podium and first win on the Japanese tyres and I remember how cool it was to see Sylvain Guintoli lead the first day of practice at Brno on Dunlops last season, or when he led his home Grand Prix at Le Mans. That kind of diversity and competition is the essence of our sport.

It would be a tough call for the privateer teams to make but I would like to see Tech 3, Team Scot and LCR stick with Michelin and keep that development process going. It wouldn’t affect the outcome at the top of the championship and when the tyres work well each of those teams would get their day in the sun, just as we did when there was only one or two teams on Bridgestone. A single tyre won’t make for closer racing because the rider and machinery remains just as important as the rubber underneath them.

As with every season, all will be revealed at the flyaway races over the next few weekends.

Randy