Andrea Dovizioso

It is difficult to ignore the contribution made by the Italian rider Andrea Dovizioso to Ducati in the second decade of the new millennium. The now 37-year-old from Forlimpopol was the 125cc World Champion way back in 2004, but is better known for his exploits with the factory Ducati Team in MotoGP, where he finished championship runner-up to Marc Marquez for three consecutive seasons in 2017, 2018 and 2019.

One of the most successful modern MotoGP riders with 15 victories (all but one with Ducati) and 62 podiums to his name, Dovizioso’s arrival in Ducati coincided, albeit a few months later, with that of the Veneto engineer Luigi Dall’Igna as Ducati Corse General Manager. Together, they oversaw and developed an increasingly successful series of Desmosedici GP machines that from 2016 onwards helped Ducati emerge from a lengthy winless period to becoming arguably the most competitive rider-bike combination on the grid at the end of Dovizioso’s time with the Borgo Panigale manufacturer in 2020.

In 2016 Dovizioso scored his first MotoGP win in seven years at Sepang (Malaysia), while the following year he found the extra pace needed to challenge for the title with six wins throughout the season, but Marquez, who also had six wins, clinched the title in the final round in Valencia. The 2018 and 2019 seasons proved to be less successful, even though he did manage to win six races and finish runner-up yet again to Marquez, with whom over the years he had engaged in a never-ending sequence of spectacular last-lap, last-corner battles for victory.