Not Dornaski nor Kaworna, but Hayate.
This is the name that has been chosen by Kawasaki for their private team.
The new team will be equipped with Kawasaki motorcycles and supporting materials, but has opted to change its name because the lack of official factory backing.
Hayate means ‘Hurricane’ in Japanese.
Marco Melandri besides stating to the Italian press that he was not informed beforehand and that it was a big surprise has also added: “I don’t know whether the bikes are in Qatar, but I guess they are.
But the team is formed: the mechanics are the same I had in the first tests, and they will be headed by telemetry man Andrea Dosoli.
”Melandri is still insisting he has no deal in place to race for a satellite team and is not even sure he wants to compete in MotoGP, delaying his decision until he’s tested the 2009 machine.
“But the discussion was very clear: since they didn’t give me guarantees on the 2009 bike, I want to try it myself, from Sunday onwards in Qatar, and then decide.
I don’t feel like starting the season with a bike that is three seconds slower than the others, and that doesn’t even get developed during the season” repeated Melandri.
Kawasaki should have called the bike Prisoner or even Dark Shadows and Melandri should really call his bike Search for Tomorrow or Another World and between Italy and Japan, they can dream up couple of more episodes to keep us entertained until the first race in April.