Dorna released the teams provisionally approved to enter in the MotoGP, Moto2 and Moto3 championships for the 2019 season.
As per the release, there will be only 11 teams competing in the premier MotoGP class in 2019 with Marc VDS not among the names mentioned after the outfit’s mid-season crisis within the management board.
The team is competing with Franco Morbidelli and Thomas Luthi in the current season using the Honda bike, but both the riders are already confirmed elsewhere with Morbidelli joining the new Petronas Sprinta Yamaha Team and Luthi moving to Moto2.
The other change is the entry of Malaysia’s Petronas Sprinta Yamaha Team which takes over the slot of Angel Nieto outfit. The Spanish team has decided to focus in the junior categories while the SIC Racing team makes its premier class debut.
With Marc VDS and Angel Nieto no longer in the MotoGP class, it means Honda and Ducati will have one less team as their satellite from 2019. Only Ducati will have two satellite outfits with Pramac Racing and Avintia Racing using the Italian manufacturer’s bike.
For the first time, KTM will have a satellite team as well as Tech 3 moves from Yamaha to KTM from 2019 with the Japanese manufacturer providing to the new Sprinta team, while Honda will have LCR as its junior team.
It then leaves only Aprilia and Suzuki as standalone factory outfits to make the field of 11 teams. On the riders’ side, only Avintia and LCR remain to confirm its second rider with Tito Rabat and Takaaki Nakagami certain to fill the spots.
On the junior classes front, Moto2 will have 18 teams and 32 bikes on the grid with Moto3 featuring 16 teams and 29 bikes for 2019.
[Check: Provisional 2019 calendar]