Wings to be banned in MotoGP from 2017

In a meeting of the Grand Prix commission today it was decided that the use of wings by MotoGP teams will be banned from the 2017 season.

The Commission made up of, Carmelo Ezpeleta (Dorna, Chairman), Ignacio Verneda (FIM CEO), Herve Poncharal (IRTA) and Takanao Tsubouchi (MSMA) in the presence of Javier Alonso (Dorna) and Mike Trimby (IRTA, Secretary of the meeting) made a unanimous decision to ban the wings, which have been controversial ever since they were first introduced at the back end of last year.

They also confirmed that teams will be able to continue to use the wings until the end of this season.

Ducati have been the main team to use the wings, with numerous winglets appearing on the Desmosedici GP16. However, nearly all the factory teams have experimented with them at some point this season.

Many wanted them banned because of the development costs associated with developing them. Formula 1 is known to have big aerodynamic development costs, and some were fearful of the smaller teams being unable to keep up with the factory teams due to a lack of financial power.