Alvaro Bautista has been confirmed to make his factory Ducati debut in the Phillip Island MotoGP race as a replacement to Jorge Lorenzo.
Ahead of the start of the Japanese GP race, Ducati announced that Lorenzo will not fly to Australia to compete in the next weekend’s Philip Island MotoGP race but instead he will go back home to continue with his rehabilitation to be ready for Malaysia.
As a replacement to Lorenzo, Ducati will field Bautista on the factory Desmosedici GP18 alongside Andrea Dovizioso as confirmed by the Spaniard’s current outfit and Ducati’s customer team, Angel Nieto.
“I want to thank Angel Nieto Team, Jorge Martíinez “Aspar” and all his crew, because they let me compete with the official Ducati team in the Australian GP,” said Bautista. “I also want to thank Ducati for the opportunity to work with them in their box.
“It will be a weekend in which I will try to learn and work as best I can, with no objective in mind. It is an illusion to be able to compete with a factory, and to do it with Ducati is a dream come true.”
The MotoGP veteran will finally get to ride a factory Ducati having spent the last two years riding an older machinery. The Spaniard has been on a hot form this year as he sits 13th with 83 points, scoring in 11 of the 14 races with a high of fifth in Japan.
The ride comes as a farewell gift to Bautista as well as he will be leaving the premier class in 2019 to join the factory Ducati in the Superbike World Championship. The replacement for Bautista at Angel Nieto is yet to be named.
Lorenzo has had a torrid few weeks after the Spaniard suffered an ankle injury during a crash in Aragon. He had a further blow on his wrist at Buriram. He traveled to Motegi still but withdrew from the weekend after just the installation lap in FP1 on Friday.