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Winglets are to be banned in all three MotoGP classes from 2017 onwards. At Assen, the Grand Prix Commission met and decided on an outright ban on aerodynamic wings, after the MSMA had failed to reach an agreement among all manufacturers on a joint proposal.

There has been much discussion of winglets over the past few months, as they have taken on an ever greater importance. With the introduction of the common ECU software, winglets were one way of reducing the amount of wheelie MotoGP bikes had.

But as the factories – and especially Ducati – gained more experience with winglets, the winglets grew larger, raising safety concerns over the effect of an impact during a crash.

Action had been expected to be taken at the previous Grand Prix Commission meeting in Mugello, but the parties failed to reach an agreement.

It looks we’ll see two Ducati recalls this week. In addition to the Ducati 1199 Superleggera recall we saw on Monday, the 2016 Ducati XDiavel S is also getting a recall from Ducati North America.

This recall centers around the rear wheel on the Ducati XDiavel S, which may have been installed incorrectly onto the wheel hub. This recall affects only the XDiavel S model, and encompasses 925 motorcycles in all.

If the rear wheel was incorrectly installed on the hub, this may cause the drive pins to fail, which would result in a loss of brakes and power from the engine.

Since a failure of this type could lead to the motorcycle crashing, Ducati North America has issued a recall with the NHTSA.

Ducati North America is recalling the Ducati 1199 Superleggera for an issue in its clutch assembly. The recall affects all 168 units that were sold in the USA – bikes manufactured between April 8th, 2014 and November 13th, 2014.

According to Ducati North America’s filing with NHTSA, the damper plate assembled between the primary driven gear and the clutch basket assembly could break due to fatigue.

After much buzz and fanfare regarding the future of Volkswagen, which in-turn called into question the future of Ducati, today we finally get a glimpse into how VW is going to soldier forth from the fallout of its “Dieselgate” scandal.

Instead of announcing how the company was going to restructure itself, and review its current business holdings and ventures, as was reportedly widely in financial circles, instead today saw Volkswagen strongly staking its future in electric and autonomous cars.

As the Wall Street Journal reported, this announcement failed to impress analysts investors; but for Ducatisti, some good news does emerge, as Ducati certainly won’t be leaving its home in the Volkswagen Group.

To drive that point further, a Ducati representative confirmed and conveyed to Asphalt & Rubber the words of Audi Chairman Rupert Stadler, who said emphatically that “Ducati is NOT FOR SALE” which is as straight and to the point as you can get.

It seems to come in waves, every time the news cycle picks up Volkswagen’s plight in dealing with “Dieselgate” that talk then shifts to the German powerhouse unloading its smaller holdings, one of which being Ducati Motor Holding.

This latest go-around comes courtesy of Bloomberg, which has Volkswagen CEO Matthias Mueller saying that the automaker’s current portfolio of companies and its overall corporate plan will be re-evaluated over the coming weeks and months.

Tomorrow (Thursday), Volkswagen is slated to make public what this new business plan looks like, but sources say that VW will put all its assets under review, which includes Ducati.

Could this lead to Ducati being divested from Volkswagen’s holdings? The answer is of course murky, but we would be very surprised by the news.

If you’re attending this year’s World Ducati Week, then you’re in for a treat, as Ducati is set to debut two new bikes at the gathering in Misano.

Details are thin at the moment, but we do know that one of the machines will be a limited-edition motorcycle that celebrates Ducati’s 90th anniversary.

Meanwhile the other bike is a new model to the Ducati range, which will be shown in a “closed room” setting as a sort of sneak peak before its official launch.

Six rounds into the World Superbike season and America has a winner in the class once again. Nicky Hayden’s Sepang success was the highlight of this passed weekend in Malaysia, but there was plenty more to the weekend than just hearing the Star Spangled Banner played.

Jonathan Rea added some more points to his Superbike Championship lead, with Chaz Davies failing to cope with the torrential rain in Race 2, which in-turn soaked up some of his championship momentum.

Tom Sykes too struggled with the changing conditions in Malaysia, showing both great and lackluster results for his weekend in Malaysia. Now 70 points behind his teammate, it will take a miracle for Sykes to wear the #1 plate again. That could make him a very dangerous man, come race day.

The pre-event announcements for the Italian GP seem to keep rolling in. First, it was Dani Pedrosa re-signing with Repsol Honda for two years; then, we got word that Maverick Viñales had done the same with the Movistar Yamaha team.

Now, we get news from Ducati Corse that Andrea Dovizioso will be with the Italian team for the next two years, with Andrea Iannone making his departure from Ducati, as well.

With this news, good money in the MotoGP Silly Season betting pool would place Iannone in the ECSTAR Suzuki garage for the foreseeable future, but time will tell on that speculation.

Yet once again, Ducati has topped Pied Piper Prospect Satisfaction Index (PSI) – showing the continued prowess of Ducati dealerships in the United States.

For those that aren’t familiar with Pied Piper, the company’s Prospect Satisfaction Index is sort of the Consumer Reports of dealership network experience, and acts as a bellwether as to how a brand is performing while facing the consumer.

As such, the PSI takes into account a mixture of “mystery shopper” experiences along with actual sales success for each brand, thus giving a mixture of subjective and objective measurement for a company’s dealer network.

In case you missed it, Jorge Lorenzo has signed with Ducati Corse for the 2017 and 2018 MotoGP World Championship seasons; but if you did miss that announcement, then the news that Yamaha Motor Racing boss Lin Jarvis will be at Thursday’s pre-event press conference at Jerez should finally convince you.

It is not so much that team bosses never appear in pre-event press conferences, but rather that such appearances are vanishingly rare, and often momentous. If Jarvis is not there to discuss Lorenzo’s move to Ducati, then something has gone very awry indeed.

We have been here before, of course. When Valentino Rossi finally announced he would be moving to Ducati in 2010, a similar procedure was adopted. So taking account of the lessons from that move, and of Rossi’s return to Yamaha, let us gaze into our crystal ball and see what we can expect for the upcoming days.

As expected, the announcement dropped today that Jorge Lorenzo will be leaving the Movistar Yamaha team at the end of this season, for a new racing opportunity with Ducati Corse.

Details are light at this time, mostly because of Lorenzo’s ongoing contract with Yamaha Racing for the rest of the MotoGP season, but we do know that the Spaniard has inked a two-year with the Italian outfit.

Lorenzo’s move to Ducati will mean a cascade of changes in the MotoGP paddock, with the next phase of the silly season process likely to focus on who will replace him as Valentino Rossi’s teammate.