After extending Fabio Quartararo’s contract with Yamaha and making him (reportedly) the highest paid rider in MotoGP at 12 million Euro per year, Yamaha has been desperate to line-up four Yamaha M1’s each race, rather than the current two. Yamaha has now enticed Prima Pramac Racing to end its relationship with Ducati and, effectively, become a second Yamaha Factory team beginning next year.
All four M1 racing machines will be equal in performance and access to new parts. Yamaha/Pramac have yet to announce who the two new riders will be on this team.
Here is the press release from Yamaha:
Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. are pleased to announce that Prima Pramac Racing will be Yamaha’s ‘second Factory Team’ from 2025 onwards, while remaining an independently owned team. The multi-year programme foresees a close cooperation between the two parties which includes Yamaha providing same spec Factory YZR-M1 bikes, riders directly contracted by Yamaha, and MotoGP engineering staff contracted by Yamaha working together with Prima Pramac Racing team staff.
Iwata (Japan), 28th June 2024 – Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. are delighted to announce their multi-year agreement with Prima Pramac Racing which will see two extra Factory Yamaha YZR-M1s lined up on the MotoGP grid from 2025 onwards.
The new second Factory Yamaha team will remain independently owned and keep their base in Rugby (UK).
The 2025 Prima Pramac Racing rider line-up will be announced in due course.
By doubling Yamaha’s current presence on the MotoGP™ grid next year, Yamaha aim to make a strong statement of their intentions to return to winning ways in the near future.
LIN JARVIS
Managing Director, Yamaha Motor Racing
These are busy times for Yamaha, both on track and behind the scenes. Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. (YMC) and Yamaha Motor Racing (YMR) have made it no secret that they are putting all their effort into bike development.
We now enter the next phase – one that we have been looking forward to for a long time: the arrival of a second Yamaha team.
The new partnership with Prima Pramac Racing will take a different form than we have used in the past.
Rather than a satellite team, with this new agreement Yamaha have put their trust in Pramac Racing, and we will be providing them with Factory bikes of the same specification used by the Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP Team.
The targets are to accelerate bike development, which remains YMC and YMR’s key priority in our quest to return to winning ways, as well as having four competitive riders in the MotoGP championship in two top-class teams.
In addition to the MotoGP programme, our collaboration includes a future Moto2 project to provide a platform to groom future MotoGP riders. It is too early to give details about this programme right now as this will be developed in the months ahead.
I would like to extend my personal appreciation and thanks to Paolo Campinoti, CEO of Pramac, and Gino Borsoi, Team Manager of Prima Pramac Racing, for their faith and trust in Yamaha. We have the greatest respect for their team, and we assure them of our full commitment to make this new partnership highly successful for many years to come.
They must be growing weary of competing for the championship.