Suzuki not ruling out 2009 deal for Ben Spies

Suzuki hasn’t ruled Ben Spies out of the running for a factory GSV-R ride in 2009.

Despite recently confirming the Japanese factory will not run a third V4 machine next season, Spies is still under serious consideration for a ride in ’09.

Much is likely to depend on how well he performs in this weekend’s American GP at Laguna Seca, but Loris Capirossi revealed in Germany last Sunday that he expects to pen a new deal in America.

Chris Vermeulen’s future is still up in the air, though he has indicated he wants to stay at Suzuki.

Factory team boss Paul Denning told MCN: “The fundamental thing is that Suzuki would prefer to keep Ben under the Suzuki umbrella if at all possible. Without question Ben’s preference would be to be with Suzuki in MotoGP and without question Suzuki’s preference would be to hang on to Ben.”