Livio Suppo Reveals His 2023 MotoGP Dark Horse And It's A Rider That Should Be On Everybody's Radar
Categories: MotoGP
Livio Suppo gives a forecast for the upcoming season and reveals his dark horse for the 2023 MotoGP season.
After Suzuki’s departure at the end of the last season, Livio Suppo is finished in MotoGP for the time being. Nevertheless, the title-winning team manager has an enormous knowledge of the premier class.
Livio Suppo and Casey Stoner in 2009 – Image provided by Motorsport Images
With regard to the coming season, however, even Suppo finds it difficult to make concrete predictions, especially without having seen the new MotoGP rockets at the tests in Sepang yet. The Italian explains to motogp.com:
“We’ve gone from the ‘Fantastic Four’ of Valentino, Casey, Jorge and Dani to probably the fantastic twelve now. There’s nobody that is clearly stronger than the others.”
The performance density in MotoGP has increased immeasurably, the field of riders is therefore well-balanced.
“I expect a very tight season. We’ve had four World Champions in the last four years – Marc, Joan, Fabio and Pecco. It means the sport is very balanced.”
Although Suppo sees his former employer Ducati ahead, an armada of eight riders makes it difficult to pick a clear favourite.
If everything goes smoothly in the Sepang tests, the Ducati teams equipped with the latest Desmosedici – the factory team and the Pramac satellite team – can be expected to fight for the title.
Whether Yamaha superstar Fabio Quartararo can keep up with the Italians again remains to be seen.
“Fabio is Fabio. He proved to be both very fast and very strong mentally because it’s not easy to do what he did in the past two years,” Suppo explained.
Should Yamaha produce an improved bike as announced, “then Fabio will absolutely be there”.
However, apart from the title candidates already known from last season, Suppo has one rider in particular on his mind.
“Ducati has a very strong team. Not only in the factory team but also at Pramac, because I strongly believe that Jorge Martin is a title contender.”
Especially toward the end of the last season, Martin showed his potential. On a fast qualifying lap, the rest of the field is inferior to the 2018 Moto3 World Champion. The introduction of sprint races next season should help the young Spaniard even more.
Should Jorge Martin be able to bring his race pace and consistency to a similar level as his qualifying performance, nothing stands in the way of the one-time MotoGP race winner. Suppo sums up: “He is my dark horse [for the title].”
