Francesco Bagnaia

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Francesco Bagnaia
Bagnaia at the 2018 Qatar Grand Prix
Nationality	Italian
Born	(1997-01-14) 14 January 1997 (age 24) Turin, Italy
Current team	Ducati Lenovo Team
Bike number	63
Motorcycle racing career statistics MotoGP World Championship Active years 2019– Manufacturers Ducati Championships 0 2021 championship position 2nd (252 pts) Starts Wins Podiums Poles F. laps Points 47 4 10 6 6 353 Moto2 World Championship Active years 2017–2018 Manufacturers Kalex Championships 1 (2018) 2018 championship position 1st (306 pts) Starts Wins Podiums Poles F. laps Points 36 8 16 6 3 480 Moto3 World Championship Active years 2013–2016 Manufacturers FTR Honda (2013) KTM (2014) Mahindra (2015–2016) Championships 0 2016 championship position 4th (145 pts) Starts Wins Podiums Poles F. laps Points 69 2 7 1 2 271

Francesco "Pecco" Bagnaia (born 14 January 1997 in Turin) is an Italian motorcycle racer competing in MotoGP for the Ducati Lenovo Team.^[1] Bagnaia is best known for becoming the 2018 Moto2 World Champion, after winning 8 races during the season.^[2] He became just the second rider from the VR46 academy to win a world title after Franco Morbidelli in 2017.^[3]

Career[]

Early career[]

Born in Turin (Torino), Italy, Bagnaia was already successful early on in Minimoto, as he won the European MiniGP championship in 2009. Bagnaia made his pre-GP 125 Mediterranean championship debut with Monlau Competición team in 2010 and finished 2nd in the championship. In 2011 he took part in the Spanish Championships in the 125cc category, winning a race, and finishing third in the final standings.^[4] In the 2012 CEV Moto3 season he rode a Honda NSF250R and once again finished 3rd in the championship behind Álex Márquez and Luca Amato, with a race win and two 2nd places in seven races.^[5] Bagnaia was recruited to be a member of the VR46 riders academy, and is still part of the academy to this day.^[6]

Moto3 World Championship[]

San Carlo Team Italia (2013)[]

Bagnaia made his Grand prix debut in the 2013 Moto3 World Championship, with Team Italia FMI riding a Honda alongside his teammate Romano Fenati. The season was a disappointing year for Bagnaia as he did not manage to get a single point in the 17 races he participated in. His best race was a 16th-place finish at Sepang.

SKY Racing Team VR46 (2014)[]

In 2014, Bagnaia switched teams to join the newly formed Sky Racing Team by VR46, riding a KTM with Romano Fenati again. After failing to score points in his rookie season, Bagnaia made clear improvements, finishing in top 10 five times during the first 7 races, with a 4th-place finish at Le Mans as his best result, where he also set the fastest lap of the race. Bagnaia missed the races at Assen and Sachsenring due to injury. After scoring 42 points in the first 7 races of the campaign Bagnaia slumped badly during the second part of the season, only finishing in the points twice of the last 9 races, clearly affected by his injury. He finished the season in 16th position with 50 points.

Mapfre Team Mahindra Moto3 (2015)[]

In 2015, Bagnaia made another team and bike change, this time joining Aspar Team on a Mahindra, with new teammates being Juanfran Guevara and Jorge Martín. In the fifth race of the season in France, Bagnaia got his first podium at Le Mans, finishing the race in 3rd place behind Romano Fenati and Enea Bastianini.^[7] In the next race at Mugello Bagnaia finished 4th, missing the podium by 0.003 seconds. He was on his way to another podium finish at Silverstone but crashed with 2 laps remaining, fighting with Niccolò Antonelli for the 3rd place. Despite improving his championship position by two places, and gaining 26 more points than the previous year on a new bike for the third straight season, this time a Mahindra, it was still an up and down year for him. Bagnaia only finished in the top 10 during five races. He also missed points in seven races, unclassified in five of those. He finished the year 14th place in the championship standings, with 76 points.

Pull & Bear Aspar Mahindra Team (2016)[]

In 2016, Bagnaia started the season with a podium finish at Losail and another podium finish at Jerez, finishing 3rd on both occasions. At his home race in Italy Bagnaia secured another 3rd position, beating Niccolò Antonelli by 0.006 seconds. Followed by a crash at Barcelona, Bagnaia secured his first Grand Prix win at the historic Assen circuit, in what his 59th Moto3 race, and the first win for Mahindra history too.^[7] He had four podiums in the first eight races of the season, and found himself fighting for the title. After two average races and a crash at Brno, Bagnaia got his first pole position in the rain-affected Silverstone and finished second behind Brad Binder in a thrilling race. Bagnaia won his second race of the season at Sepang, winning the race comfortably with a big gap after Brad Binder, Joan Mir and Lorenzo Dalla Porta all crashed out in the same corner during the beginning of the race, which was filled with multiple crashes.^[8] He finished the season with 145 points to place 4th in the Moto3 Championship with a total of 2 wins and 6 podiums. Bagnaia would have had an opportunity to finish 2nd in the World Championship behind Brad Binder, but was taken out in both Phillip Island and Valencia by Gabriel Rodrigo. Rodrigo pushed out Fabio Di Giannantonio in Australia who went down and collected Bagnaia with him. In Valencia Rodrigo made a highside crash on the first lap approaching the last corner, Bagnaia was unable to avoid.

Moto2 World Championship[]

SKY Racing Team VR46 (2017–2018)[]

2017[]

After 4 seasons in the Moto3 category, Bagnaia moved up to Moto2 racing for Sky Racing Team VR46, where he last rode in 2014. For the 2017 Moto2 World Championship, he would have Stefano Manzi as his teammate. In just his fourth ever Moto2 race at Jerez Bagnaia finished 2nd. He finished 2nd in the next race as well at Le Mans after having qualified in 2nd place, missing pole position to Thomas Lüthi by just 0.026 seconds. Bagnaia took a third podium at Sachsenring, finishing 3rd behind Franco Morbidelli and Miguel Oliveira. At Misano Bagnaia originally finished the race 4th behind Dominique Aegerter, Thomas Lüthi, and Hafizh Syahrin however Aegerter was later disqualified, promoting him to 3rd fo his fourth podium of the season. He was crowned Moto2 Rookie of the year after the Japanese Grand Prix at Motegi, and finished his rookie season with 174 points to place 5th in the championship standings, scoring points in 16 of the 18 races.

2018[]

Bagnaia opened the season with a win in Qatar, having led the race from start to finish. Bagnaia took a second win in Austin after a hard fight with Álex Márquez winning the race with a gap of 2.4 seconds and also setting the fastest lap of the race. At Jerez Bagnaia finished 3rd behind Lorenzo Baldassarri and Miguel Oliveira holding his starting grid position. Bagnaia took his first pole position in Moto2 at Le Mans, and like the race in Qatar he led from start to finish. The win was also his 3rd podium at Le Mans since 2015. Bagnaia took a 4th win at Assen, starting the race from Pole Position and leading the entire race. After qualifying 3rd on the grid in Sachsenring, Bagnaia finished the race down in 12th place, having been forced outside of the track after Mattia Pasini, who fell down in front of him in the last corner on the second lap, and despite being down in 26th, he made up fourteen places in two laps, including overtaking Álex Márquez the final corner of the last lap. At Brno Bagnaia finished third and lost the championship lead to Oliveira, but quickly retook the championship lead at Austria, winning his 5th race of the season. Bagnaia won his sixth race of the season at Misano from pole position. He took a 5th straight podium at Buriram, winning the race with his teammate Luca Marini in second place. He took his 8th win of the season at Motegi after Fabio Quartararo, who initially won the race, was disqualified due to low tyre pressure. After finishing 3rd at Sepang he was crowned Moto2 World Champion with his 12th podium of the season, his teammate Luca Marini taking his first ever Moto2 win as well, his 5th podium of the campaign.^[9]

Bagnaia finished every single Moto2 race he participated in, 36 in total. He scored points in 34 of them and was on a 30 race point scoring streak, starting from Barcelona in 2017. The streak ended when he retired from his first MotoGP race at Losail.

MotoGP World Championship[]

Pramac Racing (2019–2020)[]

2019[]

After two seasons in the Moto2 category championship, Bagnaia was promoted up to take part in the 2019 MotoGP World Championship with Pramac Ducati.^[10] He was offered a ride in MotoGP in 2018 by Pramac after his stellar rookie season in 2017, where he took four podiums and finished 5th in the championship behind Franco Morbidelli, Thomas Luthi, Miguel Oliveira, and Álex Márquez, but Bagnaia decided to stay, with an opportunity to take the championship title. He replaced fellow Italian rider Danilo Petrucci, who went to the Factory Ducati Team, replacing three time MotoGP World Champion Jorge Lorenzo, who took the seat vacated at Repsol Honda Team by Dani Pedrosa after he decided to retire after 13 seasons in MotoGP, becoming an official test rider for KTM.

After failing to score points in Qatar, where he retired from the race due to a damaged front wing, Bagnaia took his first two points in the MotoGP World Championship with a 14th place in Argentina, having started the race from 17th on the grid. Bagnaia finished 9th in Austin getting positions after Marc Márquez and Cal Crutchlow crashed out from the race in separate accidents, and both Maverick Vinales and Joan Mir were penalized with ride through penalties for jumping the start. Prior to the fourth race at Jerez Bagnaia had three straight podium finishes, starting from the 2016 Moto3 season. He qualified 10th on the grid but crashed out on the sixth lap, fighting with Pol Espargaro. At Le Mans where Bagnaia won the Moto2 race in 2018, he crashed out on the sixth lap after an incident with Maverick Vinales. In the next race at Mugello, his home Grand Prix, Bagnaia had a solid start to the weekend. He topped the second Free Practice time sheets on his way to qualify 8th on the grid. However he crashed in the last corner on the 11th lap while in 7th place. It was the first time in Bagnaia's career that he had failed to finish three races in a row, all of them with crashes. In Austria Bagnaia had his best race weekend since his time in Moto2, both in terms of his qualifying, advancing to Q2 and starting from 5th on the grid, and race pace, managing to cross the line in 7th place. At Phillip Island Bagnaia finished the race in 4th place, his best result of the season, missing the podium by just 0.055 seconds to his Ducati teammate Jack Miller. Bagnaia finished his rookie season in the premier class with 54 points, placing him 15th in the championship standings. He missed the final race at Valencia due to injury.

2020[]

For the 2020, Bagnaia received a GP20 bike, same as his teammate, Jack Miller. However, in a season that was majorly affected with races constantly being postponed or cancelled due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the first race in MotoGP wasn't held until July 19th at Jerez, with the first scheduled race at Losail being cancelled for the premier class. Despite this, Bagnaia had a strong first weekend, qualifying 4th on the grid and ultimately finishing the race in 7th position. The next race, held at Jerez, Bagnaia was even stronger than the previous race, qualifying on the front row of the grid in 3rd place. Unfortunately on lap 19, with 6 laps remaining, him well settled in to his 2nd place and on his way to a maiden podium, he had to retire with engine failure. Next race weekend at Brno Bagnaia crashed during FP1, breaking his leg, and he therefore missed the remainder of the weekend, and the two next races, being replaced by replaced by Michele Pirro. He returned for his home race at Misano, where he took his first podium of his MotoGP career, with a second-place finish behind Franco Morbidelli, fellow VR46 Academy member.^[11] He fell into a bit of a slump after his first podium however, only scoring 8 points in the last six races, eventually finishing the season down in 16th place, with 47 points to his name.

Ducati Lenovo Team (2021–present)[]

2021[]

For 2021, Bagnaia moved up to the factory Ducati team, along with former teammate Jack Miller. He started the season well, qualifying for pole position ahead of teammate Miller and the factory Yamaha riders Fabio Quartararo and Maverick Vinales, at the season opener in Losail. This marked his first career MotoGP pole position, and he would later finish the race in 3rd. In the second race in Qatar, Bagnaia finished in 6th place. At Portimao Bagnaia initially took Pole position during Qualifying, however his lap time was disallowed due to Miguel Oliveira's crash and yellow flag, which meant Bagnaia started the race from 11th. During the race Bagnaia worked his way up to finish in 2nd place behind Fabio Quartararo after Jack Miller, Alex Rins and Johann Zarco all crashed out. He finished 2nd the following race weekend in Jerez too, making it three podiums from four races. The middle of the season saw him score regular points, before he had another 2nd place in Austria. Bagnaia took his maiden premier class win at Aragon, where he set the all time track record in qualifying,^[12] and led the entire race starting from pole, successfully defending seven overtakes by Marc Márquez during the final stages of the race.^[13] Bagnaia managed to repeat this achievement the following weekend in Rimini; he broke the lap record to take pole and led the entire race to take his second career victory in MotoGP.^[14] Bagnaia secured his third consecutive pole position in Austin, and finished the race in third, cutting the championship lead of Fabio Quartararo to 52 points, with three races remaining. In Misano, Bagnaia would continue his incredible hot streak, getting pole position, setting the fastest lap of the race, before he crashed out of the lead with 5 laps to go, securing the title for Fabio Quartararo. This would not deter Bagnaia however, securing a fifth consecutive pole position in Portimao, something which has only been done in the premier class after the 1000cc rule change by Marc Márquez in 2014, and Fabio Quartararo earlier this season.^[15] He won the race in Portimao, as well as the season closer in Valencia, finishing second in the championship, with 252 points, 26 points behind World Champion Fabio Quartararo.

Career statistics[]

CEV Buckler Moto3 Championship[]

Races by year[]

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position, races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Year	Bike	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	Pos	Pts
2012	Honda	JER 8	NAV 2	ARA Ret	CAT 1	ALB1 Ret	ALB2 2	VAL Ret	3rd	73

Grand Prix motorcycle racing[]

By season[]

Season	Class	Motorcycle	Team	Number	Race	Win	Podium	Pole	FLap	Pts	Plcd	WCh
2013	Moto3	FTR Honda	San Carlo Team Italia	4	17	0	0	0	0	0	NC	–
2014	Moto3	KTM	Sky Racing Team VR46	21	16	0	0	0	1	50	16th	–
2015	Moto3	Mahindra	MAPFRE Team MAHINDRA Moto3	21	18	0	1	0	1	76	14th	–
2016	Moto3	Mahindra	Pull & Bear Aspar Mahindra Team	21	18	2	6	1	0	145	4th	–
2017	Moto2	Kalex	Sky Racing Team VR46	42	18	0	4	0	0	174	5th	–
2018	Moto2	Kalex	Sky Racing Team VR46	42	18	8	12	6	3	306	1st	1
2019	MotoGP	Ducati	Pramac Racing	63	18	0	0	0	0	54	15th	–
2020	MotoGP	Ducati	Pramac Racing	63	11	0	1	0	2	47	16th	–
2021	MotoGP	Ducati	Ducati Lenovo Team	63	18	4	9	6	4	252	2nd	–
Total					152	14	33	13	11	1104		1

By class[]

Class	Seasons	1st GP	1st Pod	1st Win	Race	Win	Podiums	Pole	FLap	Pts	WChmp
Moto3	2013–2016	2013 Qatar	2015 France	2016 Netherlands	69	2	7	1	2	271	0
Moto2	2017–2018	2017 Qatar	2017 Spain	2018 Qatar	36	8	16	6	3	480	1
MotoGP	2019–present	2019 Qatar	2020 San Marino	2021 Aragon	47	4	10	6	6	353	0
Total	2013–present				152	14	33	13	11	1104	1

Races by year[]

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Year	Class	Bike	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	Pos	Pts
2013	Moto3	FTR Honda	QAT 23	AME 22	SPA 26	FRA 20	ITA 24	CAT 17	NED 26	GER 30	IND Ret	CZE 28	GBR Ret	RSM Ret	ARA 17	MAL 16	AUS Ret	JPN 20	VAL Ret			NC	0
2014	Moto3	KTM	QAT 10	AME 7	ARG Ret	SPA 8	FRA 4	ITA Ret	CAT 10	NED DNS	GER DNS	IND Ret	CZE 17	GBR 21	RSM Ret	ARA 24	JPN 13	AUS 11	MAL Ret	VAL 16		16th	50
2015	Moto3	Mahindra	QAT 9	AME Ret	ARG 11	SPA 7	FRA 3	ITA 4	CAT 20	NED 11	GER Ret	IND Ret	CZE 12	GBR Ret	RSM 8	ARA 11	JPN 15	AUS Ret	MAL 17	VAL 13		14th	76
2016	Moto3	Mahindra	QAT 3	ARG 23	AME 14	SPA 3	FRA 12	ITA 3	CAT Ret	NED 1	GER 10	AUT 11	CZE Ret	GBR 2	RSM 21	ARA 16	JPN 6	AUS Ret	MAL 1	VAL Ret		4th	145
2017	Moto2	Kalex	QAT 12	ARG 7	AME 16	SPA 2	FRA 2	ITA 22	CAT 13	NED 10	GER 3	CZE 7	AUT 4	GBR 5	RSM 3	ARA 10	JPN 4	AUS 12	MAL 5	VAL 4		5th	174
2018	Moto2	Kalex	QAT 1	ARG 9	AME 1	SPA 3	FRA 1	ITA 4	CAT 8	NED 1	GER 12	CZE 3	AUT 1	GBR C	RSM 1	ARA 2	THA 1	JPN 1	AUS 12	MAL 3	VAL 14	1st	306
2019	MotoGP	Ducati	QAT Ret	ARG 14	AME 9	SPA Ret	FRA Ret	ITA Ret	CAT Ret	NED 14	GER 17	CZE 12	AUT 7	GBR 11	RSM Ret	ARA 16	THA 11	JPN 13	AUS 4	MAL 12	VAL DNS	15th	54
2020	MotoGP	Ducati	SPA 7	ANC Ret	CZE DNS	AUT	STY	RSM 2	EMI Ret	CAT 6	FRA 13	ARA Ret	TER Ret	EUR Ret	VAL 11	POR Ret						16th	47
2021	MotoGP	Ducati	QAT 3	DOH 6	POR 2	SPA 2	FRA 4	ITA Ret	CAT 7	GER 5	NED 6	STY 11	AUT 2	GBR 14	ARA 1	RSM 1	AME 3	EMI Ret	ALR 1	VAL 1		2nd	252

References[]

External links[]

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