Italian daily Il Resto del Carlino has reported that FIM’s Race Director Paul Butler has visited the Imola race circuit because it seems that Dorna is interested in bringing another MotoGP race to Italy.
Butler seemed to approve the track and has even said that the changes requested by Claude Danis for the WSBK race that takes place at the end of September would not be necessary.
The agreement could be in the works and Italians are already speculating if it could be actually done this year, so that it could eventually replace the Hungarian GP that was cancelled by FIM, because the Balatonring circuit will not be ready by September.
The MotoGP calendar is down one race, from eighteen to seventeen and adding another race would make sponsors much happier.
For Italian fans it would be dream, but there is a down side.
Italy already has two GP races and two SBK races on their season calendar and Imola promoters are worried that if another motorcycle race is added, would their be enough paying fans showing up for a 5th race.
Another problem would be that the Balaton MotoGP race was scheduled the weekend of September 20th, but at Imola on that date the WTCC Italian round is programmed, while the week before it’s the Crame, it would be very difficult to organize and event the size of MotoGP without rescheduling Imola’s entire September event calendar.