Test driver Dani Pedrosa will make his MotoGP return as Red Bull KTM Factory Racing’s wildcard at the Grand Prix of Styria in Austria. The World Championship event, which is scheduled to take place from August 6 to 8 at the Red Bull Ring Circuit, will mark the return to the competition after the five-week summer break.
The orange marquee has chosen its home round– and that of its title sponsor – as the perfect stage for the Catalan pilot to make his racing debut since he arrived in the team as an official test driver at the beginning of 2019.
The news has confirmed the rumours surrounding the possibility of a comeback of the 35-year-old Spaniard. Not in vain, the team from Mattighofen had previously applied to enrol Pedrosa at their local round.
KTM, to evaluate the RC16´s potential
Also, team executives had for a while expressed their interest in the Spaniard racing for them at one of this season’s GPs. This initiative is aimed at exploring the true potential of their bike, which was the source of great disappointment at the start of 2021. After a great performance leap in 2020, when the team took three victories, all progress seemed to stall at the beginning of 2021.
The results of KTM’s two official drivers, the Portuguese Miguel Oliveira and the South African Brad Binder, were in fact well below expectations during the first five races of the year. Then, their RC16 was given a new chassis and this marked a turning point. From that moment on, their growth has been astonishing.
The Portuguese rider finished second in Mugello and Germany, won in Catalonia and was fifth in Holland ahead of the summer holidays.
Binder has also seen his performance improve dramatically with a fourth-place (his best result so far) at the Dutch race. Behind that miraculous recovery was the introduction of the new chassis in Italy.
Under the current circumstances and given Dani Pedrosa’s notorious skills in the development and fine set-up of the competition bikes, KTM bosses didn’t want to miss the chance for the “Little Samurai” to assess the possibilities of the Austrian missiles.
It has been speculated that Pedrosa’s bike in Austria could be given some new features for the Catalan pilot to check out. Pedrosa has had a key role in the development of the bike since his arrival in 2019.
Dani Pedrosa, to understand better the bike
Dani Pedrosa said: “It’s been super-interesting to be part of this project from the beginning with KTM in MotoGP and being able to share my experience with them”.
“Step-by-step we did the best we could and now it’s interesting again to go into a race because it gives you a different perspective compared to a normal test. It has been a long time since my last race and, of course, the mentality for a GP is very different to a test“.
“My focus for the GP is to try to test the things we have on the bike in a race situation. I wish to understand the requests riders might have for different sessions and technical features”.
“Watching from home I can sense the improvements in the bikes and the racing but in order to understand more about MotoGP now, the new technologies and how to race and use strategies against the others we’ll make this wildcard”.
“It’s difficult to talk about my expectations after being so long away from competition. It might all click into a racing mentality or it might not but we’ll try to enjoy the weekend as much as we can.”
KTM, to push hard after Dani´s racing ‘test’
Mike Leitner, Red Bull KTM Race Manager, commented: “It will be curious to see Dani in MotoGP again. He has been away from racing for quite a long time but it will be valuable to have him in garage at Red Bull Ring to analyze the strong and not-so-strong parts of our KTM RC16 package in GP conditions and it will give him a good indication for his testing work. Dani has had a big influence in our MotoGP project thanks to all of his experience”.
“The company was working and pushing hard to follow his requests, along with Mika’s [Kallio]. Dani was a good reference as he retired at the end of 2018 while still at the top of the sport and we can see some of his influence in the current success of the KTM RC16“.
“He will have a mixture of the current race bike and some small upgrades and he will have some testing to do during the weekend but we also don’t want to overload him”.
“We want him to enjoy the Grand Prix! There are a lot of young, strong riders in MotoGP at the moment, so he will be busy but this is a good way for him to learn more and feel the current benchmark in the sport and this will help us for future testing,” concluded Leitner.
Images of Dani Pedrosa: KTM.
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