The recent spate of official rider announcements means that the MotoGP rider line up for 2023 is nearly complete.
The official confirmation by Aprilia that Miguel Oliveira and Raul Fernandez would be racing in the RNF Aprilia squad brings the total of confirmed riders signed to 18. All of the factory seats are now occupied, and just four of the satellite seats remain open.
Another day, another MotoGP team launch presentation. This time, our eye candy comes from the Ducati Corse factory team, which hopes to find grand prix greatness in the 2022 season.
Though a third of the bikes on the 2022 grid will come from the factory workshop in Bologna, not all of those machines will be 2022-spec Ducati Desmosedici GP22 race bikes.
Additionally, the photos here are almost certainly not the machines we will see on the grid in Qatar at the start of the season, but the high-resolution photos do give an indication of how hard Ducati is pushing the rules and the progress in the MotoGP paddock.
Today, the Gresini Racing Team announced that their immediate future lies with Ducati.
The Italian team, now run by Nadia Padovani, the widow of team’s founder Fausto Gresini, will lease Ducati Desmosedici machines from the Bologna factory for the 2022 and 2023 MotoGP seasons.
Can the 2021 MotoGP season match the weirdness and wildness of 2020? The circumstances are different, but the path that led to Qatar 2021 has laid the groundwork for another fascinating year.
2021 sees two trends colliding to create (we hope) a perfect storm. There is the long-term strategy set out after the Global Financial Crisis of 2008 by Dorna CEO Carmelo Ezpeleta, with support and backing from the many bright minds in Dorna and IRTA.
The penultimate piece of the 2021 MotoGP rider puzzle has fallen into place.
As has long been reported, Luca Marini and Enea Bastianini will be riding for the Avintia Ducati team next year. The young Italian pairing will be riding updated Ducati GP19s, with strong support from Ducati.
It was an open secret that Bastianini would be moving up to MotoGP after the Italian Moto2 rider announced as much at Misano in September.
Marini’s move was also long-anticipated, as protracted negotiations continued over how the VR46 Racing structure would replace the funding lost by replacing Tito Rabat, who had a contract with Avintia for 2021.
Those details took a long time to sort out, but are finally settled.
We need to talk about Johann Zarco. For a rookie to lead his very first race on a MotoGP bike is not just unusual, it has never been done before. To do so for six laps is beyond remarkable, and a sign that something rather special is happening.
To put this into perspective, it is worth noting that not only did Zarco lead the race, but he also set the fastest lap in his first race. The last rookie to set the fastest lap during their first race? Marc Márquez, Qatar 2013. Before that? Valentino Rossi, Welkom 2000. And before that, Max Biaggi, Suzuka 1998.
Zarco’s downfall came at Turn 2 on Lap 7. Quite literally: he got a little off line, hit a dirtier part of the track, and down he went. There is no shame in crashing out of your first MotoGP race.
Valentino Rossi crashed out of his first premier class Grand Prix too. On the other hand, Marc Márquez, Jorge Lorenzo, and Dani Pedrosa all finished on the podium in their MotoGP debut race. Max Biaggi actually won his first 500cc race at Suzuka.
Hanging out with Valentino Rossi has its perks. The nine-time world champion has all the cool two-wheeled toys a guy could want. He has an epic flat track course in the backyard of his house in Tavullia called MotoRanch. When his buddies come over to hang out, it’s people like Marc Marquez, Loris Capirossi, Bradley Smith, and a bevy of other professional motorcycle racers who show up.
Playing host to such a party after the San Marino GP, which takes place only a few miles away at Misano, Rossi & Co. seemed to be having an epic get-together. Thankfully, someone in Rossi’s entourage had the idea to film the 20-something riders who showed up all day to fraternize and ride.
Amongst those in attendance were Leon Camier, Loris Capirossi, Federico Fuligni, Luca Marini, Mattia Pasini, Marc Marquez, Franco Morbidelli, Chad Reed, Niccoló Bulega, Tito Rabat, Mauro Sanchini, Pecco Bagnaia, Bradley Smith, Andrea Migno, Lorenzo Baldassari, and Miguel Oliveira, though we think you’ll spot a few others in the video. Enjoy it after the jump.
“Get them while they’re young” — it worked for the cigarette industry, and the maxim holds true for motorcycle racing as well. Creating an effective system to cultivate and train young riders is the single largest reason that today we see Spanish riders dominating Grand Prix racing.
A system built in large part by the Godfather of Roadracing, Kenny Roberts Sr. himself, Spanish riders have enjoyed a federation that supports young riders and paces them throughout their career. The process has been so effective that the Italians have recently set to copying it, with their star pupil being Moto3’s Romano Fenati.
For the 2014 season, Fenati will be aboard the SKY Racing Team by VR|46, so it should come as little surprise that the personal brand of Valentino Rossi is lending its weight further to finding the next G.O.A.T. As such, the VR|46 Riders Academy has been established by Rossi and a crew of top-level instructors.
Valentino Rossi is to back a Moto3 team showcasing Italian talent from next season. The Italian will work with Sky Italia, the broadcaster who will be taking over the broadcast rights for MotoGP from next season, to field a pair of riders including current FMI Italia rider Romano Fenati on KTM machines.
Sky Italia will be the main sponsor, while Rossi’s VR46 clothing and merchandise brand will provide support and backing for the project.
Will they or won’t they? The “they”, of course, were Yamaha, and the question was whether Yamaha would start to use their seamless gearbox at Misano, something which riders Valentino Rossi and Jorge Lorenzo had been asking for a long time.
That the gearbox would be used at the test on Monday seemed obvious, but several publications – including both MCN and the Spanish website Motocuatro – predicted that Yamaha’s seamless transmission would be raced at Misano.
They were right. In the press conference on Thursday, Jorge Lorenzo was the first to break the news. “It will be here for the weekend,” he said, going on to clarify: “tomorrow.” Rossi was delighted, telling the press conference he was very happy that Yamaha had decided to start using the seamless transmission, as it could help them in their fight against Honda.