Franco Morbidelli continued his MotoGP resurgence with a first podium finish in three-and-a-half years with third place in the San Marino Grand Prix sprint race and explained how “the race is very different” at the sharp end.
Morbidelli was given the golden ticket at the end of 2023. The Italian ended a turgid three-season spell in the factory Yamaha team where he felt the sharp decline of the Japanese company’s competitiveness for a seat on a Ducati GP24 next to MotoGP runner-up Jorge Martin at Pramac.
Morbidelli was the first world champion to emerge from Valentino Rossi’s VR46 Academy when he clinched the 2017 Moto2 crown. He then shocked the MotoGP establishment by winning three Grands Prix and finishing second in the standings in 2020 with a two-year-old M1.
Before the 29-year-old could open his Ducati chapter in earnest this year, a crash while training in Portimao resulted in a concussion and he missed the entire pre-season period in recuperation.
He needed time to adapt to the Desmosedici and did not score points until round five in France, but has since posted top-10 finishes in the last six rounds, the highlight being a fifth place in Germany, until he arrived at Misano this weekend for the San Marino GP and the site of his maiden triumph in the premier class four years previously.
Quiet confidence on Thursday translated into sharp qualification form Saturday morning and second on the grid. Morbidelli then unveiled the best performance of the season to trail Martin and get to within 0.3s of Francesco Bagnaia’s rear wheel in the sprint for his first top three since the 2021 Spanish GP.
“I could stay with the top two guys since the beginning [of the sprint], and I could check them out very well,” the placid Ducati man said Saturday afternoon. “There are some areas where I'm missing, but we will try to improve for tomorrow.
“A sprint race is where the riders give all their potential: take out all the potential from the tyres, all the potential from the bike. So, for me it has a great value. To see that, especially this kind of sprint race where the top two guys are in their prime and giving their maximum, it was great to stay there.”
Morbidelli only registered three top-five race results in three years with the factory Yamaha team, although his first term in 2021 was wrecked by a knee injury. Up until his showing in Misano this weekend he has been consistently battling in the depths of the pack.
“Being in the top positions, the race is very different, and the riding is very different,” he insists.
“When you're in the group, it's full of fighting and it's full of rhythm-breaking moves. It feels much better up there!”
Although he is optimistic for the full grand prix distance at Misano, he is also realistic when it comes to showing some of that glittering 2020 form. “To be back there, I should get back winning,” he concluded. “So, we still have some margin here and there, we need to clear it up.”
