2017 Ducati MotoGP Team Unveiled In Bologna, Italy

The 2017 Ducati Team was presented recently at the Ducati Auditorium in Borgo Panigale, giving fans the first official look at the new Desmosedici GP race bike that factory riders Jorge Lorenzo and Andrea Dovizioso will will be riding in the 2017 MotoGP World Championship.

Opening the presentation was Ducati CEO Claudio Domenicali who said, "Ducati today is in a very strong position. The year that has just concluded — 2016 — was the seventh successive year of growth, and this has enabled us to reach a new sales record with 55,400 bikes delivered to our clients all over the world.

“We are a solid company, characterized by the passion and typical creativity of Made in Italy firms but also equipped with organization and discipline. A company in which racing represents something special. This is not just a marketing ploy, for us. Competition is really the strongest passion of all of us Ducatisti,” continued Domenicali.

“We are very satisfied with the progress made in the three years since [the arrival of] Gigi Dall’Igna, because the bike has gone from being one that was way behind the leaders to one that won two races last year. It is for this reason that, because of our solid situation and the prospect of further growth, we have decided, in common agreement with our shareholder, to entrust Ducati Corse with the task of bringing back the world title to Italy, providing it with all the possible human, technical and financial resources to take part in this challenge.”

One of those resources, of course, has been the addition of the 2015 MotoGP World Champion Jorge Lorenzo, who will team up with returning Ducati Corse rider Andrea Dovizioso.

Lorenzo said, “The impression I got as soon as I came into Ducati was that all the employees are really enthusiastic about their job, and they feel a strong sense of pride about belonging to this historic and prestigious company. We are all impatient about the start of this new adventure and even though we still cannot promise anything, we have the potential to create a competitive bike and aim for the results that we all want to achieve. Thanks for all the welcome messages that I have received from the Ducatisti, I am really fired up and I intend to give my all to achieve the best possible results.”

In a few days, the Ducati Team will leave for Malaysia, where the first session of preseason testing will take place at Sepang from January 30th to February 1st.