Ever since double MotoGP champion Casey Stoner retired at the end of the 2012 season aged just 27 one of the questions on most fans minds has been whether we will ever see him race again. The rider who won the title with Ducati in 2007 and Honda in 2011 has re-signed with the Italian manufacturer that took him to his first championship after parting ways with Honda at the end of 2015.
Although his role is the team’s official test rider they have entered a third bike in several races as a wildcard entry for the test rider in the past.
Stoner’s predecessor as Ducati test rider was Michele Pirro who joined the team in 2013 and replaced the injured Ben Spies in ten races that year. In 2014, he stood in for Cal Crutchlow in Argentina but also participated in five other races as an additional wildcard entry with a season best of 9th in the season finale in Valencia. Last season Pirro raced at Mugello, Misano and Valencia (with a best of 8th at Mugello) completed three seasons at Ducati with 19 races totalling 86 points.
Autosport.com reports however that Stoner says that there are no current plans for any wildcard appearances in 2016 and he does not intend to make a full-time return to racing following comments he made in an interview with Motosprint.
Although reigning World Champion Jorge Lorenzo has said he expects to see Stoner racing in 2016 as a wildcard.
“There is no plan at the moment. I’m perfectly aware that if I wanted to race Ducati would put everything at my disposal immediately but for now, we have only defined a test plan. Before going beyond that, I want to see how testing goes. At that point we’ll decide”.
Discussing his role at Ducati he said: “I have a task that also becomes an objective. I want to work well with Gigi dall’Igna so I want to help engineers and riders while we work on the new bike’s development programme. My objective is to make a contribution to the cause, to make Ducati win races again”.
When asked if he would make a full-time return to racing beyond wildcard appearances he said:
“It’s not going to happen. I say it with certainty: I won’t return to race regularly. When you decide to go racing at that level you must always push at the limit and therefore risk everything all the time. Once you manage to get out of the bubble that surrounds MotoGP you realise how much importance people give to that small world of racing. But for me there are things more important. For me the life I have now with my family counts more”.
Stoner recently celebrated his ninth wedding anniversary with his wife Adriana and the couple have a daughter Alessandra Maria who will be four years old in February.
There will be eight Ducatis on the 2016 grid with Pramac, Aspar and Avintia supporting the factory Ducati Corse team. Although Stoner says there are no plans for any wildcard rides at this time one would assume there would still exist the possibility of him taking replacement rides should the need arise.
Andrea Iannone and Andrea Dovizioso remain the factory riders for this season. Danilo Petrucci is joined at Pramac Ducati by Scott Redding. Yonny Hernandez has moved from Pramac to Aspar where he will join Eugene Laverty as the team switch from Honda to Ducati machinery and Nicky Hayden has departed to race in World Superbikes.
Avintia have retained Hector Barbera but signed Loris Baz who was very impressive with Forward Racing Yamaha last season.
