Aruba.it Ducati team boss Serafino Foti has given an insight into the decisions that led to Scott Redding being dropped from its outfit in favour of welcoming back Alvaro Bautista for the 2022 WorldSBK season.
Next year will see the Spaniard re-emerge in Ducati colours three years after he made his grandstand WorldSBK debut with the Italian manufacturer, a 2019 season that saw him romp to a record-breaking 11 wins on the bounce, totalling 16 by the end of the year.
However, it was a season that will also be remembered for Bautista’s failure to clinch a WorldSBK title he was seemingly well on course for, the Spaniard’s second-third of the year being littered with errors that allowed Jonathan Rea to take control.
Since then he has competed with Honda in a move Ducati CEO Claudio Domenicali controversially branded was purely down to accepting the biggest paycheck.
Whatever the case, Bautista endured two difficult seasons with Honda, while Ducati enjoyed a successful period with Scott Redding, who won 13 races and was runner-up in 2020 and third overall in 2021.
However, Redding’s failure to win the title would go on to cost him his seat too, with Ducati saying it didn’t meet its targets to win the championship.
“It’s been a positive Championship because we won many races with both riders. And so, we are quite happy even if our target is different because our target, our goal is to win the Championship.
“Now it's time to change the page, thinking to next year and we have a lot of jobs to do this winter and looking forward to the next season.
“Our performance sometimes has been up and down, up and down. This is one of the critical points that we need to work for the future. We need to find a base setup that works well in every race.
“ This is our goal and of course we need to work in all areas; electronics, chassis and all areas of the bike. If we fight to be consistent, we can be fast next year for sure.”
With Redding heading for BMW, instead Ducati will reacquaint ties with ex-MotoGP rider Bautista for 2022 with Foti confident it will be rivalling defending champion Toprak Razgatlioglu for the title.
“Of course, we have a good memory with Alvaro because we won 16 races together, we can't forget this. We strongly believe in him and we strongly believe in this package.
“The package is the combination of rider and bike. We will have a good advantage with Alvaro because he is small, the weight is less, for sure the top speed and we will do our best to reach, finally, our dreams, our goal. We want to say welcome again Alvaro. And, we are really excited to start the new challenge and we can't wait to see him on the bike.”
