It has been a wild week for Yamaha in MotoGP. On Tuesday, they announced that Maverick Viñales had signed a two-year contract extension to stay with the Monster Energy Yamaha squad for 2021-2022. They followed that up with announcements on Wednesday that Fabio Quartararo would be Maverick Viñales' teammate in the factory squad, and that Valentino Rossi had been given time to decide his future, and promised a factory bike, but not in the Monster Energy Yamaha factory team. And they finished the week off by announcing on Thursday that Jorge Lorenzo would be a test rider for Yamaha for the 2020 season.
That gave the Paddock Pass Podcast crew plenty to get their teeth into. Steve English, Neil Morrison, and David Emmett gathered to discuss what all this means for the future of Yamaha. What does it mean for the development direction of Yamaha? Will this allow them to finally beat Marc Marquez? What will Valentino Rossi decide to do, and how does this affect his decision to continue or retire? And does this bring a VR46 MotoGP team closer to reality?