‘Lewis Hamilton’s plan to buy team is under discussion’. The Briton himself is a big fan of MotoGP. He is a seven-time world champion on four wheels in Formula 1, but he actually wanted to race on two wheels too. That was not allowed, however. “When I was younger I wanted to race motorbikes, not cars, but my dad absolutely didn’t want that. He said they were too dangerous!”, Hamilton once said in an interview with IWC Watches .
When it was announced earlier this year that F1 owner Liberty Media would become a majority shareholder in MotoGP, the Mercedes driver said that a weekend where both world championships race on the same track should be created as soon as possible. “It’s exciting because I love MotoGP. It would be epic if we could have them on the same weekend. Maybe I could do a race in MotoGP and race a Formula 1 car on the same weekend – that would be really cool,” he winked.
The Race can reveal that Hamilton has plans to buy Gresini Racing. According to the British platform, someone from the Mercedes driver’s circle was present at TT Circuit Assen last weekend, where the Dutch TT, the Dutch Grand Prix for motorcycles, was held on Sunday and Hamilton is going to talk to the team.
Gresini Racing is located in the same Italian village as Red Bull F1 sister team VCARB, in Faenza. The team was founded in 1997 by Fausto Gresini, a two-time world champion on 125cc bikes. He passed away three years ago due to complications from COVID-19. Gresini’s widow Nadia Padovani has since become the new team principal. Gresini Racing used to compete mainly with Hondas and became world champion in the 250cc class in 2001 with Daijiro Kato. Nowadays that category is called Moto2 and they won the world title again in 2010 with Toni Elías. Jorge Martín became world champion in Moto3 (formerly 125cc) in 2018 and Matteo Ferrari a year later in MotoE with the Italian team.
After competing as a factory Aprilia team from 2015 to 2021, Gresini Racing has been competing as a Ducati satellite team since 2022. Marc Márquez is currently third in the points standings after three podiums in eight races. His younger brother Álex Márquez is his teammate.
