I'm still shaking my head over the fact that Suzuki traded Haslam for Fabrizio.
they didn't. well, i guess after a fashion suzuki did. alstare/batta did not.
at the time whether or not there would be a suzuki team at all was in question, or if there was going to be there were real doubts about whether it would be properly supported. the word from suzuki was not much support was coming.
it was clear that leon deserved a factory bike. batta stood up and did the right thing: he let leon out of his contract so he could sign with a team that for sure had factory $.