Why Ducati leans in direction of 2024 engine for 2025 MotoGP bike

Ducati has all however determined to include the 2024 engine on its 2025 MotoGP bike for numerous causes forward of this week’s Thailand take a look at.

Throughout the three days of testing on the Sepang Circuit in Malaysia, each Marquez and Bagnaia refused to disclose the engine specification Ducati plans on utilizing within the GP25 this yr.

Nevertheless, the riders had made the place for engineers very clear – it was crucial to depart Sepang with the engine resolution already made. And making an allowance for what was stated on the final day, Ducati might have opted for essentially the most conservative resolution of the 2 obtainable – to make use of the identical engine that introduced it a lot success in 2024 (16 victories out of 20 attainable).

No producer is glad to confess that the earlier yr’s engine is working higher than the brand new one, as a result of that may be admitting that the work it has finished in current months has not borne fruit. This time nevertheless, Ducati is doing so – albeit quietly – due to the outcomes it achieved with the earlier model.

Other than efficiency, two different components have contributed to the choice.

Firstly, pre-season testing in 2025 has been rather more condensed than in recent times, when there was normally a two-week hole between the 2 checks. This time, bikes will take to the observe at Buriram simply 4 days after the tip of the Sepang take a look at. That leaves no room for the producers to return to their factories to work and have the brand new elements prepared for the subsequent take a look at.

Motorsport.com understands that the producers had been polled and selected this format, though Ducati voted for the standard schedule with two weeks splitting the Sepang and Thailand checks.

As well as, the brand new laws stipulate that the manufacturers with out concession advantages should homologate their engines in Thailand, the primary spherical of the yr, and that their specification should be frozen till the tip of the 2026 season.

“We are going to evolve the 2024 bike, and we is not going to use the whole 2025 one,” admitted Ducati staff supervisor Davide Tardozzi on Friday. “The engine is among the issues we nonetheless must determine.

“We wish to be conservative as a result of, this time, the engine freeze lasts two years. We nonetheless must re-test issues, small developments, however the indications we’ve lead us to that 2024 engine. That’s the downside of getting made a motorbike that gives such excessive efficiency.”

In 2025, solely three Ducati riders can have entry to the brand new GP25 – manufacturing facility staff riders Bagnaia and Marquez, plus VR46’s Fabio di Giannantonio. In the meantime, Alex Marquez, Fermin Aldeguer and Franco Morbidelli will compete on final yr’s title-winning GP24.