It’s been a very busy period since the last race in Austria with four key players making moves in MotoGP. Luckily for you we’ve condensed all the changes into one easy to manage article.
(And not because we were too lazy to write a story for each one…so don’t think that)
Bastianini – Factory Ducati
Ducati finally broke the news that we’ve all been so bored waiting for that we hardly even cared – Enea Bastianini will be riding the factory Bolognaise bike next season.
‘La Bastard’ has had a remarkable season so far – three sensational wins, six so-so results and four sub-standard crashes. All on a bike that subliminally makes you crave Swiss chocolate. What’s not to love?
Up until Austria though Enea, who’s named after a strong scrabble hand, was always a bit lazy on Saturday often struggling to make it out of Q2. He put that right last time out in Austria by qualifying on pole and effectively put the final boot into Jorge Martin’s overly optimistic hopes of promotion.
Finally Bastianini is Italian. Which helps a lot to get a ride on a factory Ducati and even more to keep it if you’re caught breaking the law in Ibiza.
Joan Mir – Factory Honda
Statistically we’ve all been just as uninterested in waiting for the ‘Mir to Honda news’ as the Ducati announcement. HRC tried to tease us with the predictable ‘we’ve not made our mind up yet’ nonsense but, as a general rule of thumb, no one was even listening and even if they were would have struggled to hear over the smirking at Honda’s recent performances.
But is this a good move for the Spaniard who according to Wikipedia was once the World Champion? In the past a ride on the Repsol Honda always guaranteed you a shot at the title. But then Jorge Lorenzo changed all that by proving it was also possible to be laughably slow on the bike too.
The problem now though is the bike. It’s a nail. After Marc Marquez joined Honda the oriental workshy engineers soon realised that the Spaniard could win on any old rubbish they gave him. So, in the honourable spirit of doing even less than the factory graphic designers, they down-chopsticks and instead read Manga comics about giant jellyfish having sex with schoolgirls.
All this meant the Honda machine became progressively worse…up until this year where the RC213V was ‘fixed’ making the progressive worsening progressively worse.
The HRC bike now is slow in all areas and has a tendency to eject its pilots towards the nearest solid object. And given Mir has crashed in the last 60 races (or so) this could be a terrible move.
Miguel Oliveira – RNF Racing Aprilia
Miguel the Random Number Generator (MRNG) was told by KTM mid-season that they didn’t want him next season. Apparently his results were just so random that they could never ascertain if their bike was brilliant, average, or an unwanted pile of steaming seepage. Luckily Binder was around to prove it was mainly the latter.
KTM still wanted MRNG though – because if he rolls a double six he’ll magically win the race by 20 seconds. But Oliveira said he wouldn’t move back into a lower-ranked KTM satellite team. The cunning Austrian based firm then tried subterfuge by renaming their satellite team ‘FartFart’ and claiming it was a brand new, full factory team. Honest.
Miguel was having none of it. Being Portuguese he knew a thing or two about being pickpocketed and thus he wasn’t daft enough to be tricked by KTM.
Instead Oliveira chose RNF Racing riding the satellite Aprilia. It’s a great move as it’s a new team with, so far, some absolutely shocking results with Yamaha. Miguel will struggle not to improve the team’s performance.
Raul Fernandez – RNF Racing Aprilia
Despite 2022 being the sour faced Raul’s first season in MotoGP he’s made such an impression that next season could easily be his last.
Displaying a face like a sprained fungal infection the rookie Spaniard has done the very least possible whilst at Tech 3 KTM to the point where the team are glad to get rid of him. And, of course, the buy-out clause in his contract.
RNF Racing are taking a risk with Fernandez – a rider who is undoubtable very fast when he wants to be but often doesn’t. Luckily RNF Racing know a thing or two about hiring a risky rider having given Darryn Binder a ride – a daring move that essentially put everyone in the paddock at risk of being hit by a 200mph unguided missile.