Marc Marquez will not ride the GP23 Ducati that Jorge Martin or Francesco Bagnaia battled with in the final races of 2023 MotoGP for his debut race with the manufacturer next season.
Six-time world champion Marc Marquez will not ride the Ducati that this year’s title rivals Francesco Bagnaia or Jorge Martin battled on in the final stages of the 2023 MotoGP World Championship. Instead, Johann Zarco’s bike will be given to the newest Gresini Racing rider.
In 2024, Gresini will still be racing year-old spec Ducatis, but the factory and Pramac teams will be starting their MotoGP campaign on newly updated bikes.
“Marc Marquez, like all the other teams that will use the Ducati Desmosedici GP23, will start with the bike with which Johann Zarco finished the year,” Ducati general manager Gigi Dall’Igna was quoted by DAZN.
“On the bikes of Pecco Bagnaia, Jorge Martín and Enea Bastianini we introduced some more evolutions, but they gave us some problems, both in terms of reliability and performance.
“So we do not believe that these evolutions that we introduced are easy to use in private teams. We have preferred not to put certain things on them as is sometimes the case.
“We will strive to give the best of ourselves to all the riders who have Ducati written on the tank. In the end, I listen to all the riders in exactly the same way. I have never followed a single rider.
“I consider it a mistake because the important thing is to improve the bike and I am convinced that if the bike has a problem, even if the official rider does not tell me, I am convinced that if they solve the problem the official rider will also be able to be faster on the track.
“So I have always listened to all the riders all my life and I will continue to do so.”
Marquez’s bike, which will mark his debut on a Ducati will therefore not have the same upgrades as Bagnaia and Martin’s bikes received towards the end of the year, most notably a new start system or fork winglets.
