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Alonso and Spies make their moves

Sport

The driver and rider merry-go-round has seen another few puzzle pieces fall into place this week with the official, if not wholly unexpected, announcements that Fernando Alonso is to join Ferrari in Formula 1 and Ben Spies is to make his MotoGP debut with the Tech 3 Yamaha team in 2010.

Alonso’s move has been speculated for the majority of the past year and the decision by Spanish banking giant Santander a few weeks’ ago did little to dispel the rumours, but the deal has now been rubberstamped with the two-time world champion set to join Felipe Massa at Maranello next season.

That leaves Kimi Raikkonen out in the cold, a temperature the Flying Finn is no doubt used to, but it remains to be seen whether Ferrari’s 2007 champion will make a much mooted return to McLaren alongside Lewis Hamilton next year, or even leave the sport entirely.

Over on two wheels, Spies will line-up alongside fellow American Colin Edwards at Tech 3 creating an all-Texan team for 2010. The move sends Brit James Toseland back to superbikes in a straight-swap for Spies. JT will join Cal Crutchlow at Yamaha’s World Superbike Team where he’ll be looking to revisit past glory.

Mika Kallio has been confirmed at Pramac Ducati for one more season leaving just a few seats left up for grabs. But the big MotoGP news of this week is that former world champion Casey Stoner is set to make his long-awaited return to motorcycle racing’s top flight at this weekend’s Portuguese GP.

Rossi’s gunning for glory in Portugal to extend his lead of the championship and take another step closer to yet another world title, while Jenson Button will be hoping to cement his hold of the driver’s title by beating team-mate Rubens Barrichello at Suzuka in Japan this weekend.

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