MotoGP's newest team Trackhouse has debuted the livery for its first season in the championship.
The American outfit, best known for its NASCAR exploits, has taken over the grid slots of Aprilia customer RNF and has aligned itself closely to the Italian brand, basing its operations from Aprilia's factory in Noale.
Introducing our ‘24 colours pic.twitter.com/srKDRXOmNe
— Trackhouse MotoGP (@TrackhouseMoto) January 27, 2024
Its livery, however, its very much USA-themed, representing a slight evolution on the concept livery it had announced its MotoGP entry with last month - a livery that was a tribute to the USA flag bike design used by MotoGP champion Nicky Hayden in testing over a decade prior.
"It's great to have the American colours, but we truly are a global brand," stressed team owner Justin Marks. "And what's better than to have the American stars-and-stripes, on an Italian bike, with a Portuguese and Spanish rider?"
Past American grand prix champions Wayne Rainey, Kevin Schwantz and John Kocinski were among the attendees for the launch, with California native Moto2 rider Joe Roberts and his coach, ex-MotoGP rider John Hopkins also present.
There is no title sponsor in place, but the brand most visibly represented on the bike is Sterilgarda - the Italian dairy company that earlier served as the title sponsor for the Aprilia-linked Max Biaggi's Moto3 outfit and was represented on RNF's bikes in that team's sole season as Aprilia satellite.
Miguel Oliveira and Raul Fernandez, who rode then-year-old Aprilias for RNF in 2023, have both followed the Aprilia supply deal to Trackhouse.
Oliveira will have a works-spec 2024 Aprilia RS-GP from the very start of the season, while the less-experienced Fernandez will start the campaign on a year-old bike before being upgraded later on.
"At the end of the day it's just a supply-chain and material-sourcing and bandwidth issue," Marks told The Race. "I went to Aprilia in October and said 'you need four '24 bikes, not two'. That's a lift on a company that's already working so hard just to get the 2024 bikes for the factory teams done."
My beast for 2024!!#RF25 🔥🚀 pic.twitter.com/2WCxmwkmZ4
— Raúl Fernández (@25RaulFernandez) January 27, 2024
Trackhouse is the fourth MotoGP team to show off its livery design for 2024, preceded by Gresini Ducati (virtually unchanged from 2023), the factory Ducati team (a very minor change to the 2023 design) and VR46 Ducati (switching from a primarily-black to a primarily-yellow bike).
