MotoGP: Franco Morbidelli’s time has arrived
After being in the shadow of his scarily fast teammate Fabio Quartararo for the 2019 season, Franco Morbidelli is finally able to prove his worth.
Franco Morbidelli is arguably one of the coolest guys in the paddock, usually very calm and collected and doesn’t get himself too involved with other peoples business. In 2019, his name was barely mentioned, despite also being very fast on the Petronas Yamaha, this is because he was massively overshadowed by Fabio Quartararo on the same bike.
Morbidelli expected to be the #1 rider in the Petronas SRT set up when he signed for the team, being the 2017 Moto2 champion and the elder of the two riders, he had earned this right, but it did not last long.
Fabio Quartararo took 7 x podiums as a rookie in MotoGP, he was a massive underdog for the class given that he “only” had one Moto2 win to his name and came into the class as a rookie and was scrapping with Marc Marquez for victories.
In this time, Franco Morbidelli was left in the dust to adjust to the Yamaha after a season on the Honda in the Marc VDS camp and honestly, he had a pretty solid season, he took P10 overall in the standings with 5 x P5 finishes and multiple front-row starts in Petronas Yamaha 1-2’s.
2020, however, is the year he really shined, currently sat in P4 in the standings, just 25 points from the championship leader Joan Mir. So far Morbidelli has two race wins this season and three podiums, taking these podiums with supersonic speed, dominating the Teruel race leading every lap out of the gate, storming to a race win with Alex Rins struggling to keep up behind.
This is also only the start, he has the killer instinct to win a world championship and went into the 2017 Moto2 season without any wins and left with the title and 8 wins and 12 podiums, now he has started winning races, it’s going to be very hard to stop.
Featured image – www.motogp.com
