Marc Marquez and Ducati’s other GP23-specification riders will face a considerably tougher end to the 2024 MotoGP season than originally anticipated, according to The Race’s sources in the paddock, following the Italian factory’s downgrading of key components in the aftermath of Marquez’s dramatic engine failure at Mandalika last weekend.
The 2023 Ducatis have been largely unable to take the fight to the newer Desmosedici bikes this season. Much of the struggle that Marquez and his brother and Gresini team-mate Alex, as well as fellow satellite riders Fabio Di Giannantonio and Marco Bezzecchi of VR46, has faced have been so far pinned on Michelin’s introduction of a new specification for rear tyre that hasn’t worked as well with their older machine.
However, that gap between the GP23 and the GP24 looked to have come down in recent rounds, with Marquez most notably winning two races at Aragon and Misano and with Ducati’s other three satellite racers (Bezzecchi in particular) also improving - and closing the gap to GP24 runners Jorge Martin, Pecco Bagnaia and Enea Bastianini - in the past months.
That, according to The Race’s paddock sources, is in large part because the now-removed components introduced earlier this season for the GP23 machines to help them close the gap to the 2024 machines - but were withdrawn after Marc Marquez’s engine failure at last weekend’s Indonesian Grand Prix.
The engine in Marquez's Gresini-run bike met a fiery end during that race, an incident believed by The Race’s sources to have been caused by increased wheelspin that was triggered by the redesign, which in turn over-revved the engine and caused it to expire - an issue similar in nature to the one that famously ended Valentino Rossi’s 2016 Italian Grand Prix at Mugello.
What exactly Ducati has removed from the four GP23 machines remained shrouded in mystery for most of the weekend, with no one in the know in the MotoGP paddock willing to reveal the exact source of the specification change even after riders confirmed that it has nonetheless made a substantial difference to the bike.
However, following initial reporting by The Race suggesting that the part in question was the GP23’s external flywheel, sources confirmed after Sunday’s race (where Marquez finished third behind the GP24s of Pecco Bagnaia and Jorge Martin) that that was the case.
Used to smooth speed fluctuations of the crankshaft by changing the weight of the part to control how much the crank can spin, the flywheel would both help with corner entry grip and potentially contribute to the engine over-revving.
Ducati's externally-mounted flywheel is something of a specialty of the marque, and is something that can be modified without breaking the seal on the engine itself (frozen in spec for the season).
“We had some changes that affects my riding style a lot,” Marquez admitted. “But from that point we try to adapt. There’s no meaning to keep thinking about the changes. You just need to adapt to what you have.”
His sentiment was echoed by Bezzecchi, who it’s believed has been impacted even more than the others given the way in which he rides the Desmosedici.
Bezzecchi has been particularly troubled by the improved Michelin rear pushing the front on his GP23, creating understeer and hugely limiting his potential throughout the 2024 season - after he'd finished third in the championship last year.
“Let’s say that this [component] was the only thing that was improving the problem that we were having a bit,” he admitted. “Now the feeling is again a little bit worse.”
So significant is the difference, in fact, that it seems that it has been a consideration for Bezzecchi’s team-mate Di Giannantonio in his deliberations over whether to forgo the remainder of the 2024 season in order to undergo shoulder surgery.
Limited by issues in the joint since his crash at the Austrian Grand Prix in August, he’s been openly discussing the possibility of going under the knife to stabilise his left shoulder - an extensive intervention that would entail either missing races during the current season or potentially compromising pre-season testing on his new 2025-spec machine.
“I’m a little disappointed,” Di Giannantonio said after Friday’s practice at Motegi, “that from this race on we cannot use a piece that was helping us to fight with the GP24 bikes. So now I see the gap with the '24 bikes a bit bigger."
And, when asked on Saturday by The Race if it had changed his plans for the remaining races, he admitted that it’s certainly added an additional factor to his decision-making.
“Let’s say that when I received the news, I was thinking about this,” he explained. “But when you go on track you try to do the maximum, and I want to try to do all the things, all the championship.
“Surgery or not, I want to try and stay on track as much as possible. For sure, it’s super important to ride next year 100%, but also this year I want to ride and I want to compete.”
