When it was expected that Trackhouse might pick American Joe Roberts for the 2025 MotoGP season, Ai Ogura was announced by Aprilia’s satellite team for 2025 – which came as something of a surprise.
Justin Marks, the team owner, explained to CNN Sports the reason behind choosing the Japanese rider: ‘We wanted to bring in somebody that we could build, that could grow with the team and that we could be with for a long time. So, when we were looking at the rookies, you know, there was a lot of opportunity in Moto2, there’s just so much talent, there’s not really an outlier that’s like the one guy’.
Team principal Davide Brivio highlighted that picking a Moto2 rider involves some risk, since it’s not possible to evaluate them beforehand in MotoGP: ‘You kind of make a bet, you know, because you choose a guy that is in Moto2, there’s no chance to test in MotoGP. You cannot make any assessment. You just have to rely on potential, you know? In future potential. And that’s what we did with Ai. We thought he was talented. We thought that he had a riding style close to MotoGP, or potentially becoming a MotoGP style’.
In addition to the performances that earned him the Moto2 title, the rider’s attitude also convinced Trackhouse, according to Brivio: ‘Also, we really liked his approach last year, sometimes in difficulty, some bad starts, to keep recovering, resilience, and fighting’.
It should be noted that Ogura’s start to the MotoGP season has been encouraging: he finished in the top ten in the first three rounds of the year, despite being disqualified from the Argentine GP due to a technical irregularity on his bike with no impact on performance.