Compact Spaniard Alvaro Bautista looks set to replace Chris Vermuelen at the Suzuki MotoGP team for 2010 ... Scroll down for the full story

Alvaro Bautista, the talented 24 year old Spanish 250 rider, currently plying his trade in the Aspar Martinez Mapfre Aprilia 250GP team, has apparently knocked back a chance to stick with the team in 2010 to take the Suzuki yen offered to him by Paul Denning. Or so we hear.

Bautista, a race winner in 125 and 250 GPs, was offered a ride in MotoGP on the customer Ducatis that Aspar is set to run in 2010. But the canny young Spaniard has given the career-stalling (or ending) Ducati GP9 a body swerve to learn the MotoGP ropes alongside Loris Capirossi at the perennially underperforming Suzuki team. Well, if you were Bautista, what would you do if you couldn't get a Yamaha to ride in MotoGP? Exactly, you'd learn the ropes in a team nobody expected you to do well in on a bike that nobody has won on in the dry anyway. The 'trabajo e un sueño' as they say in Talavera de la Reina, assuming 'the job's a dream' is a commonly used phrase in the middle of Spain.

All of which means Vermeulen is on his way. Where? Oh, let's say...a Yamaha team.