KTM will stop at nothing
Final round of testing kicks off in Qatar as KTM zero in on Ducati
The first day of testing in Qatar was well underway as MCN went to press on Monday night and it’s shaping up to be Ducati v KTM.
Ducati’s pre-season form has been ominous, but KTM believe they are well placed to have at least one rider among the Bologna bikes after a winter when they “left no stone unturned” as they seek to reduce the gap – and Motorsport Director Pit Beirer is looking for his squad to fight for the championship.
There have been a number of updates to the RC16 during the tests in Malaysia and Qatar, with the chassis, suspension, engine, electronics and aerodynamics all addressed. More than that, KTM have sought further gains by streamlining their data analysis. Plus, the Red Bull Athlete Performance Center have been enlisted to ensure Jack Miller is better prepared than ever.
Displacing Ducati is no small task, with Pecco Bagnaia lowering the lap record at Sepang by 0.8s earlier this month. But KTM have made similar gains over the winter months, with all those involved in the project believing they are working from a more stable base than they were a year ago.
And despite the number of new parts KTM gave riders Brad Binder and Miller during the winter, the character of the bike has been tweaked, rather than changed completely. “The bike we have now is a solid base and we are working more on details,” said Team Manager Francesco Guidotti. “We can be optimistic.”
The riders seem happy, too. “We changed so many things last year, we just needed a little moment to breathe and as the year went on, the schedule got more and more hectic, weekend after weekend,” said Miller. “So just having that little bit of breathing room to understand things and make some changes and tweaks has been really good.”
KTM boss Pit Beirer was equally positive, saying: “The level in MotoGP is just crazy. The lap times just went ‘boom’ from record to record. But I feel we are really well prepared going into this new season. The bike looked good, the lap times looked good, so let’s hope for the best.
“We were fourth in 2023. So the realistic next target is to bring a rider on the podium. That’s definitely the absolute target. But we did not make all the effort to say a podium is good or we are happy. We want to fight for the championship.”
“To achieve that it’s really about improving details,” he continued. “We’ve tried to turn over every stone: electronics, chassis, suspension, engine. How we work on the race track. How we analyse data, that becomes of course a very big topic, like how quickly can you make steps over the weekend from session to session? That’s something we’ve looked at very, very deeply.”
Not only that, but the Red Bull Athlete Performance Center in Austria are helping the riders prepare. Make no mistake, KTM mean business.
‘We are here to fight for the championship’
‘We are really well prepared going into this new season’