{"id":929245,"date":"2026-10-15T16:32:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-15T16:32:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/929245\/"},"modified":"2026-10-15T16:32:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-15T16:32:11","slug":"franco-morbidelli-on-securing-most-coveted-wsbk-ride-clearly-ducati-has-some-trust-in-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/929245\/","title":{"rendered":"Franco Morbidelli on securing most coveted WSBK ride: ‘Clearly Ducati has some trust in me’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Departing\u00a0MotoGP rider Franco Morbidelli<\/a> has thanked Ducati for showing faith in him as he moves to its factory World Superbike team.<\/p>\n

The Italian has endured a tough run in the VR46 MotoGP Ducati team<\/a>, losing the confidence that made him a three-time winner back in 2020.\u00a0<\/p>\n

His dip in form led to him failing to find a MotoGP contract for 2027, but Ducati kept him in the fold with the factory World Superbike ride. The move is a straight swap with World Superbike champion Nicolo Bulega, who will make his full-time MotoGP debut with VR46 next season.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Speaking ahead of this weekend’s Indonesian Grand Prix, Morbidelli said he was aware he had not made himself an obvious choice for Ducati given his declining performance – not to mention a reputation for getting involved in incidents on the track.<\/p>\n

Read Also:<\/p>\n

“I’m happy about the chance I got from Ducati,” said the 31-year-old, whose bike will carry a special Garuda-themed livery at the Indonesian GP. “It’s not easy because after a year like this last one it’s not easy to choose me. But clearly Ducati has some trust in the job that I can do and I’m really grateful about that.”<\/p>\n

\"Franco <\/p>\n

Franco Morbidelli, VR46 Racing Team<\/p>\n

Photo by: Gold and Goose Photography \/ LAT Images \/ via Getty Images<\/p>\n

The Roman referenced quotes by Ducati’s general manager Gigi Dall’Igna at the time of the announcement, and the fact that World Superbikes will switch to Michelin rubber next season – another straight swap as Pirelli takes over as MotoGP supplier. Morbidelli will thus bring familiarity with the French company’s products to his Superbike role.<\/p>\n

“I read the words that Gigi said about me and I completely agree with him,” he added. “I’m really thankful about those words and that’s what I will try to bring. I’ll try to bring my experience with the Michelin, and my speed, which on many occasions I had.<\/p>\n

“If I get back to fight for the victory, I’ll bring my way to fight for the victory. I had that for half of my Moto2 career and in MotoGP I had it for two years. I had the chance to fight for the victory for two years.”<\/p>\n

Another departing MotoGP race rider, Maverick Vinales, was somewhat less at peace with the idea of a move to another series, and claimed ‘not to have given up yet’ in his pre-Indonesian GP debrief.<\/p>\n

Read Also:<\/p>\n

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– The Motorsport.com Team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Departing\u00a0MotoGP rider Franco Morbidelli has thanked Ducati for showing faith in him as he moves to its factory…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":929246,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,496065,107978,5745,806,805,803,804,85,107979],"class_list":["post-929245","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-franco-morbidelli-on-securing-most-coveted-wsbk-ride-clearly-ducati-has-some-trust-in-me","tag-japanese-gp","tag-motogp","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-sports","tag-twin-ring-motegi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/929245","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=929245"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/929245\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/929246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=929245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=929245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=929245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}