although they had obtained the first two places in the previous year's world championship, the opposition for the mv agustas was becoming stronger. the fim had committed to long races. the two-stroke machines had to make fuel stops or mount larger, heavier tanks which favored the mv agusta four-stroke. read was not at all satisfied with the handling of the four-cylinder machine. a tubular frame was installed instead of the old demountable double loop frame to achieve higher chassis stability. a wider swingarm was also used to allow a slick tire on the rear. gianfranco bonera broke a leg during the preseason and had to be replaced by armando toracca. giacomo agostini, sought rapprochement with the mv team, but was still employed by yamaha. toracca disliked "second driver" status and forced read to fight for third place in the opening race, causing them to lose a lot of time to agostini and kanaya with their yamahas. in austria, read was only third behind kanaya and länsivuori (suzuki). on the hockenheim circuit, pure speed was important and as a result read was able to compete with agostini, but agostini won. in imola, read had no chance against agostini and in assen he was only third. in belgium, another speed circuit, read won. moreover, agostini dropped out, as did the now fit bonera and barry sheene. read became second behind sheene in sweden but dropped out in finland, the first technical failure for mv that season. as a result, the world title battle was still open at the start of the last gp (czechoslovakia). agostini had to make a fuel stop and read won the race, but agostini's second place was enough for him to clinch the world title, the first time on a two-stroke machine in the 500cc class.