How MotoGP’s underachiever is working to reverse its fortunes in 2023

A late-season surge in 2022 allowed KTM to jump up to fourth in the constructors’ championship and second in the teams’ table. Thus, perhaps calling the Austrian manufacturer an underachiever last season seems a tad harsh.

But peel away the surface and you’ll see KTM got nowhere near where it should have been in 2022, when you consider the resources and infrastructure the Austrian powerhouse has propping up its MotoGP project.

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Overall KTM registered 240 points in the constructors’ standings (where the leading rider from each marque at every race is counted), which is 35 more than it did in 2021 and 40 more than in the shortened 2020 campaign. It matched its win tally from 2021 last season, albeit both of those came in wet grands prix, while the year before Miguel Oliveira’s sole victory was in the dry in Barcelona. Three wins in a season is still KTM’s record, when Brad Binder scored a maiden victory at the 2020 Czech GP before Oliveira managed two for Tech3 in Austria and Portugal.

But once again, like in 2021, consistency eluded the Austrian marque. Aside from his three runner-up spots in Qatar, Japan and Valencia, Binder was inside the top five just twice, while Oliveira had just three to his credit.

What let KTM down the most on Sundays was its qualifying form. Binder made 96 overtakes in 2022, the most of any rider, but was forced to do so having only started inside the top 10 six times out of 20, with Oliveira only doing so on four occasions. Contrast that to Ducati, who scored 16 poles and won all but eight grands prix in 2022 and you begin to see just how short KTM is coming up right now.

Speaking with Autosport at the season-ending Valencia GP, KTM’s motorsport boss Pit Beirer - a man who has lost not one ounce of passion for racing despite suffering life-changing injuries in a motocross crash in 2003 – offers his reasoning for why his team has lagged behind its rivals this year.

“For sure it was a difficult season, especially the low summer we had,” Beirer says. “But MotoGP is still surprising us every day because the class just gets so much faster all the time. We improved our race speed in Aragon by 20s compared to last year. So, the bike made a huge step – but the competition also made a step. So, it means you go 20s faster than last year and you are still two seconds behind the podium.

Brad Binder, Red Bull KTM Factory Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images

“But that’s part of the game, Ducati and Aprilia especially did an amazing job to make the steps they did and we couldn’t do the same. So, we are not happy for the season overall and we are really hungry to do more.”

Up until the 2021 season, KTM ran under results-based concessions, which afforded it extra engines per season and unlimited testing with its race riders. This allowed it to plough through the development of the RC16, which began its life over three seconds off the pole pace at the start of its maiden season in 2017 in Qatar.

While the loss of concessions has been something both management and riders have tried to avoid blaming for KTM’s problems, it became clear that its method of simply throwing parts at the bike to see if they’ll work on race weekends was stunting progress.

“We also changed the way of working,” Beirer adds. “Like from just [approaching] every two weeks with new parts on the track and finding out what they do, that brought us from nowhere to seven GP victories in the meantime. But we saw it didn’t take us further. So, we had to change our working method, analyse deeper and getting more data, and based on data and knowledge bringing new parts. That takes a bit longer, and then that was a really difficult moment because the people were saying ‘why is KTM not as responsive anymore?’. But it doesn’t mean [anything] to confuse the team and bring certain pieces if they are not clearly better.”

We’ve found some great people on their [Red Bull F1's] side, and since the time we worked with them, it’s been so refreshing and the ideas they have, the professional working style and the pure knowledge is incredible," Pit Beirer

In Valencia, Binder was convinced his team had “really pinpointed what we need to improve” and “everything we now try is a lot more pinpointed to an issue and we really see if it’s working or if it’s not”. For him, the key issue with the bike was its lack of drive grip and rear tyre contact with the asphalt, which in turn was leading to problems turning the machine.

KTM also concedes its original philosophy of filling it grid slots with young talent didn’t help its cause in 2022. At Tech3, it placed two rookies in the form of 2021 Moto2 champion Remy Gardner and runner-up Raul Fernandez. Both couldn’t get to grips with the bike, with Fernandez moving to RNF Aprilia for 2023 and Gardner afforded no time to prove himself after being kicked out of KTM for allegedly being “not professional enough”.

For 2023, Binder will remain at the factory squad but will be joined by experienced Ducati race winner Jack Miller, while Pol Espargaro has been recalled from Honda to front Tech3 alongside Moto2 champion Augusto Fernandez. Given Espargaro was instrumental in building the RC16 into a race winner and Miller continued to spearhead Ducati’s development up until his departure, KTM’s intent for 2023 is evident in its line-up.

Jack Miller, Red Bull KTM Factory Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images

That also extends to its technical personnel, with it poaching Ducati veteran of 17 years Fabiano Sterlacchini for the 2022 season and former Andrea Dovizioso and Enea Bastianini crew chief Alberto Giribuola for next year. As Beirer notes, “if you want to compete with the best, then you also need the best people in the project”.

It would be fair to remind readers that KTM is the youngest project on the MotoGP grid currently having just completed its sixth season, and is doing so on a bike that isn’t like any of the others thanks to its steel trellis frame and WP suspension set-up. But Beirer thinks that is an excuse that no longer holds water as “we are now long enough in the paddock that I don’t want to say we are fresh [and] that’s why we’re not there” and is convinced KTM now “has that base” you can only get with experience.

One ace KTM has up its sleeve that its rivals don’t centres on aerodynamics. This is an area of the bike Beirer believes KTM struggled with in 2022, and so has utilised its Red Bull partnership to carry out aero development at the Red Bull Formula 1 team’s headquarters in Milton Keynes.

It won’t be the magic bullet that propels KTM to the top of the podium every week, but the importance of aero in MotoGP now means this tie-up will provide a significant boost to its chances. Beirer has called the experience “refreshing” but is mindful that dipping into the space-age world of F1 will bring about a serious cost element if it is not careful.

“How to integrate is quite simple: they develop an aerodynamic package and we put it on the bike,” Beirer says matter-of-factly. “I will not tell you any details about how we work, but I can tell you it’s been an amazing experience for us. We’ve found some great people on their side, and since the time we worked with them, it’s been so refreshing and the ideas they have, the professional working style and the pure knowledge is incredible.

“So, we enjoy that relationship a lot. That’s not to fix one quick thing, it’s definitely a long-term programme where they are going to help us develop the aero of the bike. So, I’m very happy and I feel this is an important part of our future puzzle to have them on our side. If you look to the name of the project, it says Red Bull. So, it’s us together but we never really opened the door to transfer technology in that side. So, that’s really new and that’s really fantastic at the moment.

Brad Binder, Red Bull KTM Factory Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images

“We must be careful because in Formula 1 you can put one extra zero to any project at least. So, they work with completely different budget situation and power. So, where we have 10 people they have more than 100. So, the outcome is very different. So, we must be very careful because looking over to an F1 project as a MotoGP manager is like a kid in a candy store. Everything you see is so cool and so professional and you want to bring it in. But if you bring it in, to bring in every detail, you need 10 times the budget. So, that’s not realistic.”

Where once the might of the Japanese factories in Yamaha and Honda ruled MotoGP, 2022 very much saw that reversed as the ideologies of the European marques proved to be the key to success. This has forced the likes of Yamaha and Honda to think again about their own approaches.

In theory, this shift should have played more into KTM’s hands than it ultimately did. Thus, 2023 is a big season for the Austrian manufacturer who has conquered every discipline of motorsport it has entered during.

While 2022 exposed a lot of problems, it also seemingly led to KTM creating solutions to fix them and find a clear direction to go in for next season.

Brad Binder, Red Bull KTM Factory Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images