Valentino Rossi’s VR46 team has stolen the limelight at the start of the 2023 MotoGP season, the team’s second in the premier class. Marco Bezzecchi won two of five main races and is only one point behind defending champion Francesco Bagnaia in the World Championship. And Luca Marini has also finished second on the podium before.
VR46 still leads the team classification after the fifth race weekend. The question arises as to whether Bezzecchi can actually fight for the world title until autumn. In modern MotoGP (since 2002) no satellite team has ever provided the world champion.
The last time a satellite team rider became world champion was in 2001. That was Rossi’s first title win in the premier class. It was the last year of the 500 two-stroke. However, at the time, Rossi had factory material from Honda and the ex-crew of Mick Doohan at his side.
Bezzecchi and Marini ride last year’s Ducati GP22. But: “Gigi [Dall’Igna] always gives us something,” says team director Alessio “Uccio” Salucci at “GPOne.com” and reveals: “We’re also getting a technical update for Mugello.”
“Today we are demonstrating that a satellite team is there after five races and can fight for the world title. From now until the end of the season, the official teams will certainly improve, while we don’t.”
Bezzecchi and Marini officially only seeded at VR46 until the end of the season
“We’ll have to see how much they can improve. But it seems that MotoGP has reached an extreme point. You’re progressing, but it’s not that much anymore. I don’t think anyone can do half a second per can find round.”
“If anything, it will be a tenth of a second or a tenth and a half. We have to compensate for that,” says Rossi’s best friend. Salucci does not want to talk about future expectations, because one is already more than happy with the successes so far.
Officially, Bezzecchi and Marini are only set at VR46 until the end of the season. Most observers in the paddock assume that the driver pairing will remain the same next year. But with the successes, Bezzecchi’s stock has naturally gone up.
“I’m not worried,” Salucci dismisses. “I would expect Ducati to keep Marco in our team for another year. I would like their support so we can continue with him. Our team is working to get our riders into the factory team.”
“Our project was created for this. It wouldn’t be right if Bezzecchi stayed with us for his entire career. But we don’t work for other satellite teams either,” Salucci doesn’t want to know about his drivers changing to Pramac, for example.
For Salucci, the ideal situation would be if “Bez” stayed with VR46 next year but got a (higher value) contract from Ducati and the current bike. The talks are between Bezzecchi’s manager Gianluca Falcioni and Paolo Ciabatti.