Pit Beirer presented his KTM troops with the revised squad for this Arag Grand Prixón, fourteenth round of the MotoGP season. It is also the last event before an overseas tour made up of four grueling meetings. Then it will be the return to Europe for the Valencia Grand Prix, the last game of the season. Johann Zarco is no longer in the picture. In his place is test pilot Mika Kallio. But things have evolved again and this time against the wishes of the sporting director of the Austrian brand: His other driver Pol Espargaró fractured his left wrist and he is out… So much so that KTM no longer has any regular drivers in its team. official box!
A painful irony, but it is so. In stock, there are no more pilots in Mattighofen, except one Dani Pedrosa who declined the offer to replace Johann zarco ousted in Aragón : " we spoke to Dani " Explain Pete Beirer during a press conference in Aragón. “ Indeed, when we signed the contract with him, we asked him if he wanted to do wildcards, but he clearly told us no, confirming that he had stopped as a driver. We asked him again after the Zarco contract ended and the answer was the same and we respect his decision »
Will a new question be submitted to him in the event that the injury of Pol Espargaro would force him to miss the next meeting in Thailand? We don’t know, but “plan A” is as follows: “ we need Dani as a test driver, his contribution is more than I could have hoped for. He is a key person in our project. We had to ask him if he wanted to run, but his negative answer didn't pose a problem to us. »
This first question remains: who will replace Johann zarco ? " When Zarco told us he would not continue with us, it quickly became clear that replacing him would be difficult as the drivers are now all under contract " answers Beirer. " Kallio is an important part of our MotoGP project. Let's see how it goes in the next races, what level he will be and if he will be our man for 2020 or if we will have to find another solution. At the moment there is no response. »
But there is one certainty: “ I will no longer take Yamaha drivers » assured the same Beirer. It will be recalled that Zarco, Syahrin and Smith are former drivers who played on an M1. Like Pol Espargaró in fact. But the latter is the only one to have successfully made the transition to the RC16…
