The exciting question of who will ride the second Gresini-Ducati in the 2024 MotoGP season has a deadline of “two, three races” in relation to Fabio Di Giannantonio.
One of the biggest question marks in the MotoGP transfer carousel for the 2024 season currently concerns the second Gresini-Ducati. While they have extended Alex Marquez’s contract by one year until the end of 2024, it is currently still up in the air as to who will be the Spaniard’s teammate in the new season.
Jake Dixon was recently considered the top favourite for the second Gresini-Ducati. The Briton, however, extended his contract with the Aspar team in the Moto2 World Championship this week. The reason for this is probably that the Aspar team represents the GasGas brand, which in turn belongs to the Pierer Mobility Group, to which the KTM brand also belongs.
Another rider who had already been linked to the second Gresini-Ducati for the 2024 MotoGP season before Dixon is Tony Arbolino. In the meantime, however, the Italian has also extended his contract with his current Moto2 employer (Marc VDS).
So the question arises anew with regard to the Gresini team: Will Alex Marquez have a new team-mate in the 2024 MotoGP season? Or will Fabio Di Giannantonio, known as “Diggia”, who has been riding for the Ducati satellite team since 2022, be allowed to stay for a third season?
“Two, three race deadline” from Gresini for “Diggia “
“Our priority is to give ‘Diggia’ more time,” Gresini sporting director Michele Masini told MotoGP.com at the start of the Spielberg weekend, taking the opportunity “not to talk about other riders”.
Of Di Giannantonio, Masini says: “We have always believed in him. We brought him to the Moto3 World Championship once. We competed in the Moto2 World Championship and now we are racing MotoGP.”
“We know that it will take results, which we have not achieved so far. But we are still taking our time to make a decision,” said the Gresini sport director. However, he also indicates that Di Giannantonio does not have until the end of the season to put an exclamation mark on his future.
When asked if there would be a deadline for the team to make a decision on whether or not “Diggia” would stay for 2024, Masini replies: “I think the next two or three races will be the deadline. “
If you include the Moto3 and Moto2 classes, Di Giannantonio and Gresini have been a unit for almost eight years (with an interruption). At the 2015 Moto3 season finale in Valencia, “Diggia” made his World Championship debut with the Italian racing team. He then spent three full seasons in the small class, where he finished runner-up to Jorge Martin in 2018.
Who comes in when Di Giannantonio leaves?
Di Giannantonio began his Moto2 career with Speed Up in 2019 and 2020 before returning to Gresini for the 2021 season. And a year later he moved up to the MotoGP class within the team there. In 30 Grands Prix in the premier class so far, he has managed five top-10 results in the races and one pole in qualifying. He has yet to finish higher than P8 in the races.
Now that both Jake Dixon and Tony Arbolino have renewed their Moto2 contracts, the most exciting question is: Who will take the place next to Alex Marquez if Gresini and Di Giannantonio part ways at the end of the season, as expected? Significantly, Di Giannantonio himself has already knocked on the door of Moto2 teams for 2024.
Franco Morbidelli is potentially being linked to the Gresini team. However, based on the latest developments, he is more likely to get the second Ducati in the Pramac team if Marco Bezzecchi does not accept this very place next to Jorge Martin and rides for the VR46 team in 2024 instead. So the question of the second Gresini rider in 2024 remains exciting.
