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This week the 2020 MotoGP season started with the first official tests on the asphalt of the Ricardo Tormo Circuit in Valencia. The new motorcycles of the teams, including the Ducati Desmosedici GP20 , went on stage with their sights set on the next championship before the winter break.

The last great title for Ducati was in 2007 with the Australian Casey Stoner. Since then, Valentino Rossi, Jorge Lorenzo and Marc Márquez's explosion, with six titles in their showcases, has left Borgo Panigale's team in the background. However, the Italians breastfeed with minor wins. They are proud of the latest aerodynamic designs in the fairing of their MotoGP. An innovative system that has also been replicated by the Repsol Honda Team itself.

Looking ahead to the next season, the Ducati factory puts all the meat on the grill. For the first time he will have four official motorcycles in the race, two in the ranks of the Ducati MotoGP team and two with Pramac Racing, to face the Cervera rider after three runners-up in a row with Andrea Dovizioso. But how was the new Marquéz motorcycle designed?

Gone is now all the tireless work with the simulator at the Bologna factory, the trainings with the test driver between grand prizes and collaborations with the main technology companies to win a few tenths of a second on the track.

Ducati mechanics checking the motorcycle in Misano's paddock.

One of the most intense alliances of the World Cup paddock was the one signed just a year and a half ago by the Italian manufacturer and the Chinese company Lenovo. An agreement that a priori can be strange. But, since then, the transalpine brand has made a complete digital transformation in which big data prevails in all its operations.

In full competition each MotoGP motorcycle has 60 sensors on board and downloads up to 30 GB of documentation after a day of testing. A data package, which unlike Formula 1, is transferred in deferred since Dorna's current regulations prohibit both the transmission of real-time information and the use of GPS. Engineers only have a basic telemetry system that is also broadcast on television.

"Today, technology supplies the brain that some pilots don't have," Ducati sports director jokes, Davide Tardozzi. The truth is that still 70% of the key decisions for a victory depend on the human factor. Even so, the transmission of data from the track to the servers in the box and to the jobs in the factory are constant during a weekend of races.

"Today technology supplies the brain that some pilots do not have"

Davide Tardozzi

The information obtained from the sensors, and transmitted from Lenovo laptops by the servers of the American firm NetApp, is organized in a few minutes. In this way, Ducati engineers also offer detailed information to pilots about the most optimal angle of inclination, even reach 64 degrees, and the speed required to take a curve sun, rain or blow wind from the side. All at speeds above 300 km / h.

Dovizioso rolling with the new Ducati Desmosedici GP20 in Cheste. Jordan

"I like to say that a fast rider gives electronics a very important base. So he knows where the motorcycle's limit is . We can suggest the best stroke or the right braking point, but the rider decides ", highlights Ducati software and strategy manager Gabriele Conti.

"We can suggest the best layout or the right braking point, but the pilot is the one who decides"

Gabriele Conti

Beyond providing equipment with track data, computer studies have also allowed Ducati to simulate the behavior of a motorcycle before its wheels touch the track. With possible engine mappings or scenarios of the ideal route, the technical staff employs artificial intelligence that allows motorcycles to recognize possible situations that were impossible to quantify 10 years ago.

"With the camera on board you can deduce the revolutions that your rider is going and also the gear engaged at all times. It helps us a lot, but there are other moments that everything depends on the feeling of the rider himself whether the motorcycle works or not, " Gabriele Conti adds.

Ducati's next victory in MotoGP 2020 will still depend largely on the human factor, but thanks to technology they will get a little closer to the final win.

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Know more

  • Marc Márquez
  • Lenovo
  • Valencia
  • Jorge Lorenzo
  • Andrea Dovizioso

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