Enea Bastianini

A stunning second season in MotoGP has propelled Enea Bastianini into the factory Ducati team, alongside reigning champion Francesco Bagnaia, for 2023.

Enea Bastianini - Route to MotoGP 

While it took Bastianini five seasons of Moto3 racing to step up to Moto2, he secured the intermediate class title at only his second attempt.

Indeed, one could say Bastianini deserved to step up to Moto2 - and therefore MotoGP - earlier than he did after securing third in the overall Moto3 standings as long ago as 2015 for what was his second season in the category.

Though he won only a single race, his consistency earned him a lofty finishing position, a strength that would be highlighted again in 2016 when he scored only one victory en route to the runners-up spot behind Brad Binder. 

Despite these results, Bastianini would continue to spend the next two seasons in Moto3, managing just one more win with Leopard Racing in 2018 before eventually moving up to Moto2 in 2019.

Joining the Italtrans Racing Team, Bastianini was the standout rookie performer, proving a consistent top ten racer and peaking with a run to third at Brno. He’d end the year tenth in the standings, marginally behind top rookie Fabio Di Giannantonio.

Sticking with Italtrans for 2020, Bastianini got his title winning campaign off to a good start by scoring two wins from the opening four races at Andalucia and Brno.

Though he achieved just one more win - at Misano - he kept arch rival Luca Marini honest before the Italian lost his momentum in the closing stages of the year, while he’d repel a late charge from Sam Lowes when the Briton crashed in Valencia and injured himself.

As such, after a nervy final round showdown in Portimao, Bastianini’s fifth place finish would be enough to land him the title by nine points.

By that stage it had already been confirmed that he would be MotoGP bound for 2021 after signing a contract with Ducati and being placed at Avintia Racing alongside Marini in an all-rookie line-up running two-year-old GP19 machinery.

Avintia Ducati (2021)

Johann Zarco had taken the same Avintia GP19 bike to the team's first pole and podium in 2020. But despite the growing age gap to the 2021 bikes, Bastianini was able to stand on the podium twice on his way to 11th in the world championship (two places higher than Zarco the previous year).

That's despite failing to qualify higher than ninth, his main Achilles' heel in his rookie season. Indeed, Bastianini's Misano rostrums were only achieved after charging from just twelfth and 16th on the grid.

Although beaten to top rookie honours by race winner Jorge Martin on the latest GP21, Bastianini scored more than twice the points of team-mate Marini, the only rider on equal machinery.

Gresini Ducati (2022)

With Avintia taken over by VR46, Bastianini was moved by Ducati to the new Gresini-Ducati collaboration - the late Fausto Gresini's squad returning to full Independent status after previously serving as Aprilia's official team.

While the GP22 riders were still struggling for a set-up with the latest updates after pre-season testing, Bastianini and his year-old bike blasted to victory in the Qatar opener.

It was the first of four wins that kept the young Italian in mathematical title contention until the penultimate round, on his way to third in the world championship.

A duel with Jorge Martin to take over Jack Miller's 2023 factory team seat probably served as a distraction for both youngsters during the middle stages of the year, with Bastianini getting the nod ahead of Ducati's home round at Misano in September.