Francesco Guidotti began his new career as team manager of the KTM factory team at the Sepang field where a three-day shakedown took place. Two days are coming up this weekend which will bring the regular drivers into contention, which means for the Italian that his official drivers Oliveira and Brad Binder will join Tech3 rookies Raul Fernandez and Remy Gardner on the Malaysian track. After ten years within the Ducati Pramac satellite team, Guidotti must now have a broader and more distant vision of his influence and the scope of his positions. By pointing out Pedro Acosta, great hope of the Grands Prix and nugget of the KTM sector, as still an unknown with a view to a rise in MotoGP from 2023, has the Italian made a mistake? Time will tell but the competition could step into the breach to already give guarantees to the young Spanish driver...
The subject of the riders who will be on the MotoGP starting grid in 2023 is already topical even though the 2022 season has not even started. But the transfer market doesn't care. He lives in his own space-time and everything discussed there is a sensitive subject. Francesco Guidotti, new team manager of the factory KTM, nevertheless went to this arena to take a stand. And quite clearly when speaking of the case of Peter Acosta whose trajectory towards MotoGP could ultimately slow down…
Guidotti said so on GP One : " you will have to work on both the bike and the riders. In my opinion, Oliveira and Brad Binder showed they deserve this position at KTM. They both won races. They knew how to exploit the moment and that is an important characteristic of a pilot. Even though the season didn't go very well, they were able to take advantage of the best chances they had ».
Guidotti: “ If you have a working motorcycle, you don't need to go looking for the riders. They come knocking on your door«
He adds at the dawn of this 2022 season: “ In my opinion, if we manage to give them more regular material, the results will come. At the moment we are very focused on what we have to do on the bikes, also because if you have a working bike you don't need to go looking for the riders. They come knocking on your door. The priority is therefore to put the motorcycle in order and to do well with current drivers. The idea is then to cultivate the entire KTM nursery and bring it to life magnificently ».
A “nursery” whose key element appears to be Peter Acosta. And yet, here is what the successor of Mike leitner : “ it's too early to talk about Acosta in MotoGP. He will do very well in Moto2, he has already shown something good in testing but taking him to MotoGP so soon would be risky. I plan to move forward with the drivers we have in 2023 Also. Then, you have to do the calculation during the year but I find it premature to talk about Acosta in MotoGP ". An opinion which stands but which could be interpreted by the competition as the signal to approach the Spanish prodigy with guarantees of promotion to MotoGP.
