Hoffman sacked by D'Antin

[osg]

Career suicide.........

http://www.crash.net/news_view~cid~6~id~154579.htm

Hofmann sacked.

Monday, 17th September 2007

As suspected on Sunday evening, Alex Hofmann has been sacked by the Pramac d'Antin Ducati Team for pulling out of the Portuguese Grand Prix due to a lack of motivation.

Hofmann, who had to start from the pit lane on his spare bike, withdrew from last place with 17 of the 28 laps remaining, saying, "I don't have the motivation to fight for the last positions."

This infuriated Luis d'Antin's team, who warned on Sunday that they reserved the right to drop Hofmann for the remaining four rounds of the 2007 MotoGP season – and have now done so.

A to-be-announced substitute rider will thus join Alex Barros from this weekend's Japanese Grand Prix, with Chaz Davies thought to be top of the list. Davies successfully replaced an injured Hofmann at Laguna Seca and recently completed a two day test for Ducati.

Meanwhile, Hofmann now has no chance of staying with the d'Antin team next season and - despite being the only German rider in MotoGP - may be forced to start a new career in Superbike racing.

[Ranger]

You'd hope this was just a one off, but that is pretty dumb. You'd reckon he could just crash and save the career suicide in doing so. :\

[NinjaMaster]

I guess from Alex's point of view, it just accelerated the inevitable. He's usually keen to go but giving your all to have no chance of running higher than last for a team he was highly unlikely to ride with next year was obviously enough to break his spirit. It was out of character and hopefully he can get a decent WSB ride next year.

[ArmchairBikeFan]

Yeah, if he had an ounce of sense he would've lowsided at a slow corner and apologized to the team for trying too hard, rather than announcing that he couldn't be bothered trying at all!
Well, he only lasted as long as he did in MotoGP because Dorna wanted to help the German TV ratings. You can't stick around for ever getting trounced by your team-mate (unless you're Edwards, but he has a decent excuse.)

[fatman]

Hoffman deserved to be sacked. I've never really been a big fan, can't say I hate the guy either but he just never seems to try as hard as everyone else.

There are plenty of riders who would kill to ride around at the back of the field just to say they have done it. Its great to hear that Chaz will be riding in Japan. Hopefully he gets the chance to finish the season.

My guess is that Ducati will hire him as a test rider next year and will use the last races to try out a couple of different stand in riders.