YAMAHAS TOP RACER FRANCO MORBIDELLI FIGHTING FOR HIS MOTOGP FUTURE IN 2023

By Bhawna

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Franco Morbidelli is an Italian racer who rides for the Yamaha MotoGP racing team. He is a top racer for Yamaha. He has been riding for Yamaha since 2011. He started his career with European Superstock 600 championship in 2011. In 2013, he won the championship. In 2017, he won the Moto2 World Championship. He came to MotoGP in 2018. He joined Yamaha in 2019.

In 2023, Franco Morbidelli is having a tough time securing his future in MotoGP. Morbidelli’s contract will expire after the end of this year. It has to be renewed and he doesn’t know whether it would continue or not. Morbidelli knows that one has to work hard in racing. Morbidelli worked with Valentino Rossi in 2014. And then, this helped him join the Moto2 world championship in 2017 where he was a winner. And further, in 2020, he became runner-up in the MotoGP championship. So, Rossi has played a major role in Morbidelli’s career.

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Morbidelli says that the biggest help that Vale and Yamaha can do is basically give him battle. According to him, it is the overcoming of challenges that make you all the more a better person. He wants to become a better rider. Vale has been very competitive in the ranch. In the last year, Morbidelli was facing a lot of difficulties but training with Vale made him keep going.

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In 2013, there was the sudden death of Morbidelli’s father. So, things became difficult on the financial front. But with Rossi’s guidance, Morbidelli was able to face the tough situations bravely. In 2019, he had a bad rivalry with Fabio Quartararo. But this didn’t affect him and he won 3 races in 2020 season. On the other hand, Fabio Quartararo was in the 8^th position. So, this shows how much strength Morbidelli possesses.

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Now, the situation is even tougher. In 2021, Morbidelli came to the factory Yamaha team instead of Maverick Vinales. Yamaha has not made any improvements in its M1. And all of this has aggravated the problems for the future of Morbidelli in 2023.

There were many changes in Morbidelli’s career from 2021 to 2022. The 2021 championship was good. But in 2022, there was a change in the crew chief. So, that was another change when he was already dealing with his injury. In 2022, he had to spend a lot of time bouncing back to good health. Morbidelli had a knee injury in 2021. This decreased his performance. When he was back as a Yamaha factory rider, he wasn’t fully fit. He was also learning a new bike which was taking time.

 He says that the competitors of Yamaha have become better than Yamaha. Things became adverse because of the change from the 19 bike to the 20 bike. It was a new composition of the bike. It was a transformation but some things got missed in this.

Morbidelli defeated Fabio Quartararo for one time in a grand prix. This was his first complete season for the factory Yamaha team. But in the end, Morbidelli had lesser points than Fabio Quartararo.

In 2023, the major challenge for Morbidelli is that his contract has to be renewed at the end of this year. The 2023 season wasn’t that good for Morbidelli. He was in 16th position in Portugal and in 14^th position in the grand prix. On the other hand, Quartararo was in 10^th and 8^th position. He had changed his riding style and been more with a fighting approach. But the thing was that he was trying on new bikes and that made him go astray. He went back to older ways but couldn’t make it. Fabio Quartararo also went back to older items on the last day of testing.

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But Morbidelli has matched to Quartararo in the initial rounds of 2023. However, the results don’t it that way. Morbidelli is working on different things and approaches and becoming better. He was behind in qualifying by less than one second which is different from the past. But looking at the things in totality, the things are quite difficult.

Morbidelli isn’t that lagging behind compared to Quartararo’s results. Morbidelli doesn’t feel that Yamaha is undermining his potential. He has become all the better after the problems he had last year. He wants to improve his game. He is trustful of himself. The situation is tough. But he knows how to be more focused. There is always uncertainty. But it isn’t that much. He finds more trust in the Japanese people as compared to that of his team. But he believes in keeping up the hard work.

Yamaha will release their lineup for 2024 in July 2023. So, time is critical for Morbidelli for his MotoGP future. But Morbidelli is tough enough to face the challenge.

Franco Morbidelli says that he wants to be with Yamaha as a factory rider. Morbidelli can lose his seat because of Jorge Martin. But Morbidelli says that he will be with Yamaha. And that, people talking about him gives him more energy.

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Yamaha has said that Morbidelli is their first choice. So, if Morbidelli can match up to Quartararo- then this will make his place in Yamaha certain. Morbidelli’s performance isn’t that short in comparison to Quartararo’s. Morbidelli feels that if he is not performing at the top he has to work much more. Morbidelli visualizes himself on the MotoGP bike.