Hope dies last! Former MotoGP World Champion Fabio Quartararo has extended his contract with Yamaha for two more seasons

Yamaha and its last world champion Fabio Quartararo have added another piece to the MotoGP puzzle for the 2025 season, with the 24-year-old Frenchman signing for two more seasons with the stable he started his career with in the premier class in 2019. The 2021 champion is not currently enjoying the happiest of times on the Japanese-made machine, which, along with those of rivals Honda, has fallen well behind European shots from Ducati, Aprilia and KTM.

The era of the Japanese factories dominating the most prestigious motorcycle championship for decades has come to a depressing end during the current decade. The remaining protagonists in the MotoGP series from the land of the rising sun, Honda and Yamaha, have been pulling speedily behind their European rivals in recent seasons.

The International Motorcycle Federation (FIM) and series promoter Dorna have taken pity on them with a new form of concession tailored to them. However, the once almost invincible stables are happy to pick up a few points in their pockets with every big prize.

The latest event of the current season, the VC of Portugal, proved once again that Yamaha rider Fabio Quartararo is capable of much more than a seventh-place finish, and that too gifted by a couple of retirements from the leading riders. Yamaha bosses believe the same, and they and the 2021 World Champion have signed a new contract to continue working together until the 2026 season.

Yamaha’s statement confirming the new contract

“Keeping Fabio with the factory team is an integral part of the Yamaha MotoGP project. Fabio is an exceptional talent, a hard worker, a great team player and has many years ahead of him as a rider,” praised Yamaha boss Lin Jarvis in an official team statement. “We have made significant changes to our organization to accelerate the process of our return to winning ways.”

Jarvis followed up his words by expressing confidence in his charge’s understanding of the current situation Yamaha finds itself in. He admits that his stable has a lot of work ahead of it in returning to a level comparable to the 2021 season and the first half of the following one. Finally, the Yamaha CEO highlighted the Frenchman’s positives in building the team atmosphere needed to move the stable forward.

In the same report, Quartararo himself expressed hope for a better tomorrow with the stable in blue. “Last winter Yamaha proved to me that they have a new approach and a new aggressive mindset. We still have a long way to go to start fighting for wins again. I will work hard and I am confident that together we will achieve our dream again.”

Quartara’s history in MotoGP

Since joining MotoGP in 2019, Quartararo has shone right from the start with unusual speed and predation, which earned him pole position in his fourth race in the premier class. He ended his initial adventure among the world’s fastest riders with a fifth place overall and seven second- or third-place finishes. He waited until the opening round of 2020 to claim his debut victory.

A year later, he was already celebrating his first world championship title, with the course of the first half of the 2022 season suggesting a successful defence. At the time, however, he was the only driver on the Japanese machine who could regularly challenge for podiums.

Sadly, since his triumph in Germany, neither he nor his undoubted talent has arrested the Japanese’s inexorable fall behind their European rivals. Quartararo finished last season in a final tenth place with three third places. In all cases, he was helped to those results by the crashes of riders circling ahead of him up to that point.

Source: MotoGP, Yamaha Racing