The Brazilian will make his MotoGP<\/a> debut in 2026 with the LCR<\/a> squad alongside Johann Zarco, though there have been rumours that Moreira\u2019s deal will see him step to the factory Honda team in 2027.<\/p>\n On Friday at the Australian Grand Prix, Cecchinello revealed there are no concrete plans to suggest Moreira will be an LCR rider in 2027 – though he stressed the importance of continuity for his team in terms of commercial partnerships.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, to be honest, Diogo signed with Honda HRC,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n \u201cHRC asked us to have Diogo for 2026 for sure. About the future, I don\u2019t know where HRC will decide to place Diogo.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have also two years still with Johann Zarco, \u201926 and \u201927.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s very important for us to keep the stability and keep going on with this philosophy.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s very important, not only from the point of view of our working flow and working system.<\/p>\n \u201cBut also to show the sponsors that we can carry on programmes and sponsorship activations with the same riders.\u201d<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Somkiat Chantra<\/p>\n Door not shut on Somkiat Chantra\u2019s MotoGP future hopes<\/p>\n Moreira will be LCR\u2019s third rider in as many years on the Idemitsu-backed side of the garage, with Somkiat Chantra replacing Takaaki Nakagami this season.<\/p>\n That side of the garage is specifically set up to field top Asian talents, and was a seat earmarked for 2024 Moto2 title winner Ai Ogura before he joined Trackhouse Aprilia instead.<\/p>\n Chantra\u2019s rookie season has been a struggle, with Honda disregarding his data given his lack of pace on the bike relative to his stablemates.<\/p>\n But Cecchinello believes Chantra has \u201cpotential\u201d and noted \u201cnever say never to seeing Somkiat\u201d again in the future.<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n \u201cOf course, Honda, Dorna are very much interested in providing opportunities to riders from Asia,\u201d the team owner added.<\/p>\n \u201cThe reality is that it is a little bit, probably, early to have a sky-high potential Asian rider.<\/p>\n \u201cSomkiat definitely has that potential, but we can see he needs a little bit more time to learn the category and learn the bike.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s why HRC maybe decided to move him to World Superbikes, but they didn\u2019t close the door on him to come back to this side of the garage.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, let\u2019s hope to start well with Diogo and never say never to seeing Somkiat back in our garage.\u201d<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Subscribe to our MotoGP Newsletter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LCR MotoGP team boss Lucio Cecchinello admits \u201cI don\u2019t know where\u201d Diogo Moreira will race beyond the 2026…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":220616,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,914,15613,806,805,803,804,16242,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-220615","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-motosport","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-honda","11":"tag-lcr-honda","12":"tag-motor","13":"tag-motor-sports","14":"tag-motosport","15":"tag-motosports","16":"tag-somkiat-chantra","17":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220615"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220615\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/220616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Somkiat](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/gng_1241335_hires.jpg\")
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