Hayate Racing gave Melandri 1 year contract
Italian rider motivated to show potential in 2009, having cancelled Kawasaki contract.
Marco Melandri will contest the 2009 season as a Hayate Racing rider in a single-rider, single-year deal, the Italian has confirmed to motogp.com. His previous two-year contract with Kawasaki has been torn up and a new agreement hastily arranged in time for the start of the coming season, one in which he will ride a Ninja ZX-RR with no further factory development.
MotoGP News: Melandri warns of need for time after Qatar return
New Hayate Racing bike requires adaptation for MotoGP star.
Always a bluntly realistic rider, Marco Melandri has warned that he will need time to get fully acquainted with the Hayate Racing bike that has salvaged his participation in the 2009 season. The second fastest man on track on Sunday night in Qatar, in a session that saw reduced activity as a result of rainfall, Melandri put in the most laps of any rider -35- as he searched for comfort on the Ninja ZX-RR.
MotoGP News: Melandri makes 2009 test debut with Hayate Racing
The very first rider out on track at the MotoGP Official Night Test at Qatar on Sunday evening was Marco Melandri, testing with the newly formed Hayate Racing Team.
Wasting no time whatsoever as the Qatar test commenced it was Marco Melandri who undertook Sunday evening’s first lap of the floodlit Losail International Circuit.
MotoGP News: Melandri to start 2009 season in one-rider Kawasaki team
Kawasaki have announced that after constructive talks between themselves, Dorna and additional third parties, a new one-rider team will participate in the 2009 MotoGP World Championship.
The decision was made after negotiations which followed Kawasaki’s January 2009 announcement to suspend its factory supported MotoGP activities, due to the global economic downturn.
