The 2021 season was Danilo Petrucci’s last in MotoGP. After the 2022 Dakar, he sets out for a new challenge on the asphalt in the AMA Superbike, with the rider leaving not only because he has no seat for him, but also because he is tired of the premier class due to the pressure it brings .
Quoted on motosan.es, the italian spoke of his unusual bet on the 2022 Dakar without prior preparation: ‘The plans didn’t materialize until last august, after telling KTM that one day he wanted to compete in the Dakar. It was something I’d always dreamed of doing, but honestly, I’d never imagined taking part so quickly. Looking back I think the timing couldn’t have been the best’.
Petrucci then explained that the Dakar helped him to regain the feeling of having fun on a motorcycle, after getting tired of the pressure that exists in MotoGP: ‘I was tired of the constant pressure you face in MotoGP. I no longer had the feeling of having fun riding motorcycles and I believed that I could regain that in the Dakar. But, of course, I knew it was going to be a challenge with so little time between the end of the MotoGP season and the start of the Dakar’.