MotoGP
Maverick Vinales set for KTM MotoGP switch
Maverick Vinales is set to leave Aprilia at the end of the 2024 MotoGP season and join KTM’s stable next year, Motorsport.com can reveal.
Oriol Puigdemont
Edited: Jun 12, 2024, 8:54 PM
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The Spaniard will bring the curtain down to his three-year stint with Aprilia, which has so far yielded one grand prix victory in Austin this year and a total of seven podium finishes.
He will join the structure currently managed in tandem by Tech3 and KTM’s parent company Pierer Mobility group, the team which currently competes under the GasGas banner.
He will be partnered at Tech3 by five-time grand prix winner Enea Bastianini, whose place in the factory Ducati team will be taken over by Marc Marquez next season.
As announced previously, Brad Binder and Pedro Acosta will race in the factory team, although KTM intends to put four identical bikes on track this year between its two teams.
With Vinales now poised to join KTM, it means Aprilia will lose both its current factory riders, with Aleix Espargaro having already announced his decision to retire from MotoGP at the end of the year. Motorsport.com understands he will move to Honda in a test rider role next year.
Initially, Vinales’ intention was to explore the possibility of extending his contract with Aprilia, which handed him a reprieve in 2021 following his acrimonious split from Yamaha. However, the Noale-based brand preferred to wait for Espargaro to decide his future, before sitting down with Vinales to negotiate a contract.
Things took a turn on Monday after the Italian Grand Prix when Aprilia announced it had signed Jorge Martin from Pramac, at great expense, after Ducati chose Marquez as Francesco Bagnaia’s team-mate for 2025-26.
Maverick Vinales, Aprilia Racing
Photo by: MotoGP
It remains to be seen who will not occupy the second factory RS-GP at Aprilia, although current VR46 riders Marco Bezzecchi and Fabio di Giannantonio are seen as the most likely candidates.
Born in 1995, Vinales debuted in the World Championship in 125cc in 2011 and won the Moto3 title two years later, achieving up to 12 victories in his three years in the minor class. Entry-level category.
After a single season in Moto2 in 2014 which yielded four victories and a best finish of third in the standings, he made the leap to top category as an official Suzuki factory rider in 2015.
He went on to record his maiden MotoGP win for Suzuki in 2016 before moving over to Yamaha.
In his debut with the Iwata marque, replacing Jorge Lorenzo and as Valentino Rossi's team-mate, Viñales won his first two races, in Qatar and Argentina, and the fifth, in France.
Between 2018 and 2021 he added five more race wins to his tally, although it wasn’t enough to fight for the title.
In mid-2022 he decided to leave Yamaha, before being dropped following an unpleasant incident in Austria, which then led to his switch to Aprilia.
In 2025, and in his eleventh season in the premier class, Vinales will compete for a fourth different manufacturer.
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