Yamaha: Rossi’s final MotoGP season “totally valid”

Yamaha boss Lin Jarvis concedes Valentino Rossi’s final year in MotoGP was “disappointing” in terms of “pure results” but says his decision to continue in 2021 “was totally valid”. Rossi brought his illustrious MotoGP career to an end last month in his 432nd and final grand prix at the Valencia finale, calling time on a 26-season span which yielded nine world titles and 115 victories. The Italian had planned to spend the first half of 2020 evaluating his form to see whether he should continue into 2021, but had his hand forced by the COVID-19 pandemic completely reshaping that season’s calendar.

 Ousted from the factory Yamaha squad in favour of Fabio Quartararo for 2021 having made that decision to wait and see his form, Rossi lined up on the grid with Petronas SRT on a factory-backed M1. Results proved hard to come by, though, with Rossi scoring a best of eighth in a hectic Austrian Grand Prix on his way to his worst-ever championship placement of 18th on 44 points. Despite this, Jarvis believes Yamaha would have taken the exact same decision it did to let Rossi continue racing in 2021 in hindsight. “26 years in the paddock, 16 years with Yamaha in two different terms,” Jarvis began. “Obviously Valentino wanted to start this year with the energy and effort to try again, because last year was COVID, it was weird, we started in July, we had 14 races, there were no spectators. 

“There were many, many things going on, so Valentino really wanted to try to do a full season and to see if he could still be competitive. “But it was clear in the early stage of the season the level had been raised again, all the young riders were getting faster and faster; Fabio was incredibly fast, Maverick won the first race, etc. “And I’m sure he will be the first to admit the season was disappointing for him in terms of pure points, pure results. “But I still think his year was totally valid, and if we were in the same decision again – even with hindsight – I still think we’d do the same decision again because I think he needed to do this extra year, to finish his season in style.”