With the news coming out today that Ant West will not be able to make the grid for the 2012 motor GP season, due to his inability to find funding for his ride, brings up an interesting take on where the sport of MotoGP, motorcycle racing, and motor sports in general fits in with life today in our current economic environment.

Young riders coming up today, and even current riders, need to understand that they are no longer being paid to race. This is a major change in mindset, what they are paid to do is work as a marketing tool for their sponsors and patrons. For most of the history of athletics and motorsports, one of two things had to happen for you to compete, you either were either wealthy, or, you had to have a wealthy patron. Patron, another term for sponsor, is something that disappeared, for the most part, post-World War II on a personal level. Post World War II sponsorship came from corporations rather than people though that really didn't become visible until the 1960s with the Lotus Formula One team.

Just hours after Ant West announced on his Facebook page that he would not be racing in MotoGP, as he was unable to find the sponsorship to fund his ride at the Speed Master team, the team issued a press release announcing West's replacement. Italian rider Mattia Pasini is to take West's place, and ride the Speed Master Team's Aprilia CRT bike in MotoGP for 2012.

Rumors had emerged earlier today that Pasini would be racing in Moto2 in 2012, with much speculation that the Italian would be riding for the Stop & Go Racing team. Those reports were based on an announcement on Pasini's Facebook fan page that he had finally signed a contract for the upcoming season, but only later did it emerge that Pasini would be racing in MotoGP rather than Moto2. Despite West's obvious ability - masked during his time at MZ by organizational problems in the team, which made it impossible to ensure a consistent setup for the bike - Pasini is a more natural fit with the Speed Master project. Pasini is highly popular in his native Italy, and having an Italian rider on an Italian bike in an Italian team is a much easier proposition to sell to Italian sponsors.

Below is a press release on the injuries suffered by Alex Rins, Spanish 125cc champion who will be riding for Monlau Competicion in Moto3 this season:

MotoGP's long winter break is drawing to a close, and the testing season is about to kick off once again. For the last couple of years that's been very easy to follow, as everyone headed to the official MotoGP tests organized by IRTA. With the introduction of the Claiming Rule Teams, however, MotoGP's testing schedule has become a lot more complex, as some of the CRT teams will be joining the test in Sepang, while others will be remaining in Europe.

Below is the schedule as we know it so far. Everyone on a factory prototype (that is, all of the factory and satellite teams) will be heading to the two Sepang tests (Jan 31st - Feb 2nd, and Feb 28th-March 1st), with Colin Edwards on the NGM Forward Suter BMW and the BQR CRT team consisting of Ivan Silva and test rider Robertino Pietri aboard the FTR Kawasakis at the first Sepang test at least. The Aprilia-powered CRT bikes will be firing up their engines in Europe, starting at Valencia on January 30th. PBM's James Ellison will join the Aspar bikes at Jerez on February 20th, while a fuller compliment of CRT bikes is expected at Aragon on March 8th. Testing then culminates at Jerez in late March, as everyone gathers for the final CRT test.

Popular Australian rider Ant West is to retire from motorcycle racing. The popular Australian made the announcement on his personal Facebook page, citing the failure to raise sufficient sponsorship to be able to pay for a ride for 2012. West was signed up to ride an Aprilia CRT machine for the Speed Master team in MotoGP in 2012, but was unable to find the 250,000 euros that the team had demanded he bring to the ride.

West posted on his Facebook page that he had attempted to sell his car, his motocross bike and his house in Switzerland to help fund the Speed Master ride, and had even offered his house as collateral. That had not been sufficient to save his ride, however. The Australian faces similar problems racing elsewhere, as all the other teams are demanding that West bring money to a ride, and West cannot afford to do that.

The BMW World Superbike squad spent two days testing at Valencia, where they worked mainly on electronics strategies and the latest version of the BMW S1000RR engine. Below is the press release issued after the test:

The Kawasaki World Supersport team issued the following press release after their test at Valencia:

MotoGP is looking eastward. As the involvement and interest from and in Asia has continued to grow in recent years, the importance of the region - beyond the historic role that Japan has played in the series, that is - to both the MotoGP series and the manufacturers has become increasingly evident. With Yamaha riders Jorge Lorenzo and Ben Spies visiting the region a couple of times over the winter, and Dorna CEO Carmelo Ezpeleta hinting at more races in Asia in coming years, the Asian dimension in MotoGP is set to grow in the near future.

The addition of "Semakin di Depan", the slogan used by Yamaha's subsidiary in Indonesia, to the factory Yamaha M1s back in 2010 was the first sign of change, and Honda followed suit in 2011, with the addition of the "Satu Hati" slogan, used by Honda's Indonesian subsidiary, to the factory Repsol Honda machines. Meanwhile, Yamaha's factory riders have been making marketing trips to Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and other countries in the region on a regular basis since 2008.

There is good news and bad news for MotoGP fans. The bad news is that the MotoGP schedule has been changed - again. The good news is that the season now starts a day earlier, as the Qatar MotoGP round will once again be spread over four days instead of three, and start on Thursday, April 5th, 2012.

The decision sees the race following the same schedule as in 2011. Last year, the race was switched from a three-day to a four-day format to avoid the problems with the track becoming slippery late at night, which had caused several big crashes during testing in 2010. Having an extra day of practice makes it easier to fit all three classes into the period between sunset and the time the temperature starts to approach the dew point. Riders have repeatedly complained of the track becoming treacherous from incipient dew forming on patches of the track between 11pm and midnight. Spreading practice over four days means that all of the riding gets done before 11pm.