Michele Masini, sporting director of the new Gresini-Ducati MotoGP project, aims to return to Gresini’s glory years as the “reference” satellite team in the premier class.
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Gresini was runner-up in the MotoGP World Championship in 2003, 2004 and 2005 with drivers Sete Gibernau (twice) and Marco Melandri as the satellite Honda team.
The team won a total of 14 premier class races with the RCV before the switch to 800cc engines meant that all satellite entries suffered compared to official factory teams.
Nonetheless, Melandri, Toni Elias, Alex de Angelis, Marco Simoncelli and finally Alvaro Bautista stood on the podium for Gresini during the 800s era. But Gresini has been absent from the MotoGP podium since 2014, his last season with Honda.
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However, a new partnership, as Aprilia’s entry into the factory began the following year, has so far proven elusive, and the two parties will go their separate ways in 2022 when Aprilia gets their own network slots and Gresini is once again fully independent as a satellite from the Ducati team .
“It was Fausto’s dream and maybe this is the foundation: the extra motivation he gave us to ensure that Gresini Racing can return to old glory,” said Masini, who has been a member of the Gresini team since 2008. “The goal is to ensure that the team repositions itself as a reference point among the MotoGP satellite teams.
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“We work side by side with Ducati on all fronts; the goal is to have a team with a high technical level that is young and ambitious at the same time: it will be a mix of trustworthy Gresini Racing employees with some newcomers who do a lot Have experience with Ducati.
“The team will consist of around 25-26 people. 20 of them from Gresini Racing and five from Ducati Corse: a track engineer and an electronics technician for each driver and a spare parts manager.
“We worked for a year to find a top-level structure for hospitality and team trucks. In the next few weeks we will have a clearer idea of the graphics that Drudi Performance is maintaining. The goal is to achieve November with a winter test graph that will be similar to our picture of 2022. “
Enea Bastianini, who is currently spending his rookie MotoGP season with Avintia Ducati, and Gresini Moto2 rider Fabio di Giannantonio will lead the new MotoGP team with GP21-based machines.
While the original agreement between Gresini and Ducati spanned two seasons, compared to three years for VR46 and Pramac, Masini aims to establish the roster as a valued part of the driver development managers for the Italian plant.
“We want the best synergy with Ducati because we want to be Borgo Panigale’s point of reference as a kind of junior team where the riders can develop and grow,” he said. “We want to work well and with team spirit, because we are and will remain the #GresiniFamily.”