The rumours of the last few weeks have now been officially confirmed and Jorge Martínez will run an Aspar MotoGP team with Ducati. The announcement was confirmed at Donington on Saturday. The Aspar team would run one Ducati in 2010, and then field a team of two bikes in 2011.

Jorge Martínez told MotoGP.com:
“It seems that after three years we are finally able to achieve our dream of presenting a MotoGP project. It’s been three years of fighting and looking for the best option and, after sounding out various factories, we have finally reached an agreement with Ducati. I hope that this will be a fruitful arrangement that will continue in the long term. In theory we will have one rider in 2010, with the idea being to expand to two in 2011.”

“Our goal is primarily to grow strong in MotoGP from a technical viewpoint. We will continue with the 125cc team and compete in the Moto2 class, so we feel that this is a big step for the whole team. Today the big news is that we are moving up to MotoGP with Ducati, so the second thing that we have to do is confirm a rider. We hope to be able to do this by the time we get to Brno.”

Unsurprisingly it is Álvaro Bautista that the team have set their sights on:

”It would be great to convince Álvaro Bautista to come up with us and he is our first option for the MotoGP team. He has been with us for a long time, winning a 125cc World Championship and finishing second in 250cc, so it would be great for him to continue with us,”

The question is – would Bautista really want to jump straight on a satellite Ducati in MotoGP? It’s a team and a set-up that he clearly wants to stay with – but the challenges would be high, and they would have limited opportunities for data collection from running one bike. But with new riders needing to now see through their first rookie season on a satellite team, it would certainly give him the entry he wants into the Premier Class. That said, Tech-3 and Suzuki have yet to confirm their rider teams for 2010, so other opportunities do exist.

Our bet is that he’ll take it and stick with what he knows – Aspar.

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