- MV Agusta re-enters the World Championship after a 42 year absence.
- This prestigious Italian motorcycle brand, which still retains the most titles worldwide, with an experienced racing Team
- MV Agusta & Forward Racing Team united to write a new chapter in the history of motorcycling.
MV AGUSTA HISTORY
1907-1945
The history of Agusta started in 1907, when Count Giovanni Agusta, a Sicilian aristocrat with a passion for flying machines, founded the Agusta aeronautics company. He soon moved to Northern Italy, in Cascina Costa near today’s Malpensa airport. Count Giovanni died in 1927, his widow Countess Giuseppina and son Domenico succeeded him at the helm of the family business. After the war the airplane industry had dramatically declined, and Domenico decided to diversify into motorcycles, yet airplanes production was not abandoned. It soared again through World War II, but motorcycles had definitively entered the company’s DNA.
1945-1960
As a consequence of the war, airplane production was forbidden in Italy, so the Agusta focused on motorcycles. They cre- ated the MV “Meccaniche Verghera” brand in 1945.
The first MV branded motorcycle was officially launched in the autumn of that year. Originally.
It went down in history as the “MV 98”. The Agustas’ passion for avionics clearly showed in their motorcycles, giving them a raging racing soul, and the MV 98 started a winning string for the brand that was to last for decades.
1960-1992
Mass car ownership caused a sharp decline in the sales of production motorbikes, yet Agusta’s response was to offer ever innovative models that appealed to the true motorcycle enthusiasts.The strategy paid off also thanks to MV’s uninterrupted successes on the race tracks. 1965 was the start of what was probably the most celebrated combination in the history of racing motorcycling: that of Giacomo Agostini and MV’s inline three-cylinder.
1992 – PRESENT
In 1992 the Mv Agusta trademark was acquired by Claudio Castiglioni’s Cagiva (CAstiglioni Giovanni VArese), that had star- ted producing motorcycles under its own brand twelve years earlier in Schiranna,on the shores of Lake Varese, after taking over the ailing Aermacchi-Harley-Davidson short-lived venture.The move proved immediately successful as the MV Agusta brand had retained most of its enormous popularity with racing bikes enthusiasts.
FORWARD RACING TEAM HISTORY
The history of the Forward Racing Team began in 2009, when Kawasaki decided to withdraw from the World Championship. Media Action, a communication and marketing agency, that was already operating in the MotoGP paddock, saw the op- portunity to start a new adventure. After having the infrastructure and manpower, that was once work in Kawasaki, already in place and being already deep within the motorcycle racing sphere, they ventured into this new adventure, embracing the new Moto2 philosophy of brining the racing in the medium category on a more sustainable economy.
Giovanni Cuzari, by that time CEO of MEDIA ACTION, guided by his passion for this sport, decided to trust this new, ambi- cious and ecxiting project, in form of the FORWARD RACING TEAM in the debut season of the Moto2 category.
From the earliest beginning in the Qatar, the team immediately showed its potential kicking off its campaign with a front row start and a podium finish at the season opener. During the year more podiums followed, with the highlight being a victory in Silverstone. Thanks to the experience of the team me bere and the during the with Jules Cluzel and Claudio Corti competing for the team.
2011 proved to be a test season, surrounded by a series of complications that the team overcame brilliantly and managed to turn a difficult year into a year of consolidation. In the same year a large and prestigious Italian company, NGM Mobile, became the main sponsor in FORWARD RACING, officially giving birth to NGM Mobile Forward Racing Team. Sharing com- mon goals, both companies agreed to a sponsorship plan signed on a multi-annual basis.
In 2012 NGM Mobile Forward Racing Team made another step forward by entering the MotoGP class with Colin Edwards in the first year of CRT rules, as well as continuing its Moto2 adventure with Alex De Angelis and Yuki Takahashi. In the MotoGP category the team will always be remembered as the first team to get both, the pole position and the win at the first Grand Prix in CRT history.
In Moto2 a third place at Sachsenring and a spectacular win at the Malaysia GP showed the constant development of the team driven by experience, competitiveness, cooperation, motivation, ambition, energy and passion, that have been and will continue to be the stimulating factors of NGM Mobile Forward Racing Team.
In 2013 the team literally doubled its number of riders and bikes in both, the MotoGP and the Moto2 class. In MotoGP Texan Colin Edwards (double Superbike World Champion) was joined by Italian Claudio Corti. Alex De Angelis teamed up with Spaniard Ricky Cardus and fellow Italians Simone Corsi and Mattia Pasini.
The 2014 season started with a new challenge and a rider line-up, which was even stronger. NGM Mobile Forward Racing Team renewed its commitment to world-class motorcycle racing entering the new Open Category in MotoGP World Cham- pionship with the experienced Colin Edwards and talented Aleix Espargaro, the overall CRT winner for two consecutive years. Alongside the MotoGP team, the NGM Mobile Forward Racing Team confirmed the Italian duo of Simone Corsi and Mattia Pasini in the Moto2 class. Aleix Espargaro and the team finished the season winning the Open Class World Championship, celebrating one podium in Aragon and one pole position in Assen.
The line-up in 2015 was completely renewed with the new duo of Stefan Bradl and Loris Baz in MotoGP, riding the Forward Yamaha as well as Simone Corsi and Lorenzo Baldassarri in Moto2 with the Kalex bike. The season ended up on a high note as Loris Baz was able to come second in the general standings of the Open category, while Lorenzo Baldassarri climbed up the podium for the first time and finished off the season as top-scoring rider from Italy.
In 2016 the team focused on Moto2 with a full VR46 Riders Academy line-up consisting of Lorenzo Baldassarri and Luca Marini, of which the latter just graduated from CEV Championship. With a first win at the team’s home round in Misano, Baldassarri completed the season in eighth position overall, while Marini delivered some top ten results during his first cam- paign at World Championship level.
The 2017 saw the same lineup of the preceding year for the team Forward in grate of departure. But with the entry of the team also in the championship of preparation to the world championship, the CEV, as principal exponent has introduced Lukas Tulovic and Federico Fuligni.
The season is concluded enthusiastically with a qualification on the Catalan circuit of Baldassarri, that saw him actor at the third position on the grid.
2018 season’s principal exponent of the Forward Racing Team are one of the VR46 Riders Academy’s cadet, Stefano Manzi, and the young Brazilian talent, Eric Granado, whom has concluded the last season as European champion of the CEV (Speed European Championship) and also winner of the Brasilian’s championship.
GIOVANNI CASTIGLIONI – MV AGUSTA PRESIDENT
“I am really proud to see the dream to rejoin the Motorcycling World Championship come true. I would like to thank all our engineers, technicians and designers, plus the staff of the Forward Racing Team for having carried out this project in such a short amount of time. I want to express my gratitude to Giovanni Cuzari, as he believed in us and pushed us to do our best. Of course there is still a lot of work ahead of us, but step by step we will improve our competitiveness.”
GIOVANNI CUZARI – TEAM OWNER
“I have been chasing this dream since Claudio (Castiglioni’s) era. Many times I have insisted with Mv Agusta for a return in MotoGP, and, when Giovanni has taken the place of his father, I have often encouraged him to believe in such an ambitious project. Finally he did it, and today, 42 years later, we will take the first steps with the Moto2 MV Agusta prototype. I am very emotional but aware that this is only a first outing, and that there is a huge amount of work ahead of us. I got to know closely the Castiglioni Research Centre, the true heart of MV Agusta, and now I’m convinced that we have everything to accomplish a great prjoect: the passion and professionalism of the group guided by Paolo Bianchi, together with my fantastic team, which I thank individually, is definitely the right mix to be able to aim for the best. Today’s is a starting point to get to bring this brand back really high. A special thanks goes to all those who supported and support this project, now the attention goes to the track.”
BRIAN GILLEN – PROJECT LEADER
“It’s a few years now that we are thinking about a return to the Motorcycling World Championship and with the modification of the regula- tions of the Moto2 category for 2019 it’s the perfect opportunity to express our technical know-how, that we developed during the last six years in which we raced in Superbike and Supersport.
The Moto2 project is an ambitious one and we are involving our R&D resources and all our racing experience in order to develop a comple- tely new bike, which differs from all the others and which reflects the values of MV Agusta.”
