The Ducati rider who is much more than just the brother of a MotoGP legend

He may not carry the Rossi surname, but it is a well-established fact at this point that Luca Marini is nine-time motorcycle grand prix world champion Valentino Rossi’s brother. And he rides for the VR46 Ducati team.

When the VR46 squad announced its intentions to step up to MotoGP in 2022, it was destined that Marini would bag one of the seats. But Marini has had to earn his place the hard way. His early Moto2 results were nothing spectacular, but that started to change in 2018 with the VR46 team when he scored his first grand prix victory.

He scored two more in 2019 and three in 2020 on his way to runner-up in the standings, earning him a step up to MotoGP in 2021 with a VR46-backed side of the Avintia garage on a two-year-old Desmosedici.

At the end of the year, he was absolutely trounced by his team-mate Enea Bastianini, who outscored him by 61 points in the standings and managed two podiums. Marini scored 41 points in total, with a best result of fifth in the wild slicks-on-a-wet-track finale to the Austrian Grand Prix.

A first glance at his results in 2022 aboard the current-spec Ducati don’t immediately jump out as anything special. He is one of just two Ducati riders after Gresini rookie Fabio Di Giannantonio not to get on the podium this season, and didn’t score a pole position unlike rookie team-mate Marco Bezzecchi.

But Marini beat Bezzecchi 9-6 in terms of race results (based on the grands prix where both finished) and outscored him in the standings by nine points. When the lanky, softly-spoken Marini sits down with Autosport for a chat about his year in the VR46 hospitality at the season-ending Valencia Grand Prix, the Italian is far from upset by his results in 2022.

“No, no, I’m really satisfied and sincerely at the beginning of the season if I knew I could achieve these kinds of results I would be happy, very happy because I think last year I struggled so much and this year the team was new, the bike was new, we struggled at the beginning of the season,” Marini offered when Autosport suggests he may be disappointed by his 2022, given what team-mate Bezzecchi and the other Ducatis achieved this year.

“It was not easy, and we started very [far] back. Now we are in a consistent way and we are there every time in the top six and this makes me feel really happy. But every time you finish P6 you say, ‘I want a little bit more because we are getting closer to the podium every race’, but not enough to be there. But we need to be smarter and more clever and say ‘OK, this season we learned a lot and grew a lot, and next year we are there fighting for the top’.”

While Marini remains his own man, the connections to his superstar older brother are unrelenting

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Peel back the surface and you’ll see that Marini’s season was arguably the most complicated of any of the Ducati riders. Former team-mate Bastianini, current team-mate Bezzecchi and Di Giannantonio all began with fully developed 2021 bikes. Therefore, they could just focus on riding. Pramac’s Jorge Martin remained with the same team he raced his rookie campaign, while both he and Bastianini kept their crew chiefs despite the latter switching to Gresini.

Marini, on the other hand, moved from Avintia to VR46, from a 2019 bike to the 2022 Ducati and switched from Luca Ferracioli to David Munoz as crew chief (the latter having stepped over from Petronas SRT as Rossi’s ex-track engineer).

The 2022 Ducati also had a difficult start to life. The new engine developed for it was very aggressive under acceleration, which ultimately prompted eventual world champion Francesco Bagnaia to ask for a hybrid 2021/2022 motor to be fitted to his GP22 at the factory team.

"I remember Qatar race was the worst, but also my data engineer was new, his first time in MotoGP so for him it was also difficult, also with my crew chief we needed to understand my base setting. And we missed the first four, five races for this" Luca Marini

None of the satellite riders had that luxury. With all of those changes, Marini admits 2022 began like a second rookie season.

“Yeah, the feeling is that,” he says when asked if he felt like a rookie again in 2022. “Sure, you know the tyres, which is really important; you know the electronics. But what I learned this year is so much more compared to last season. And this is a huge step to be fighting for even bigger positions next year because last year I struggled to take points. This year I’m there every time, I achieved – in my opinion – good results, good points in the championship, and if I’m able to make another step like I did this year it’s perfect.”

Marini took solace in those early races, when he was fighting for 13th in Qatar, 14th in Indonesia, 11th in Argentina, 12th in America and 16th in Spain while Bastianini was winning on his 2021 bike that the other 2022 Ducati runners were all having problems. Gleaming this from the data he has access to from his Ducati counterparts, he used this to not get it into his head that problems he was facing were down solely to him.

After a shaky start to 2022, Marini found a way to ride the GP22 this year

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“The bike was difficult to ride,” Marini notes. “It was difficult to stop. The feeling is that the electronic part of the bike – the engine braking, the first part of the throttle, the traction – were not at 100%. Then, the bike was developing every race.

“I remember Qatar race was the worst, but also my data engineer was new, his first time in MotoGP – he worked with me in Moto2 – so for him it was also difficult, also with my crew chief we needed to understand my base setting. And we missed the first four, five races for this. But I remember the bike also needed some time, because I saw the other riders like Zarco, Pecco, Miller struggling, Martin struggling a lot. So, I said, ‘OK, it’s not just me’. But Ducati worked really hard and in five races they fixed everything and I remember from more or less Le Mans, Mugello, everything went well.”

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From Le Mans onwards, he was in the top 10 in 10 of the last 13 rounds and scored a best of fourth twice in Austria and the San Marino GP. Until the Thai GP, Marini had never actually crashed in a race, and it wouldn’t be until a technical issue forced him out of the Malaysian GP that he never saw a chequered flag. Every other Ducati rider in 2022 registered at least three DNFs through various incidents.

The school of thought in motorsport is that it’s easy to make a fast rider less crash prone; it’s hard to get a slow rider to be fast. Marini’s approach, however, isn’t anything conscious. He’s pushing, but he just understands there’s a limit at times that once crossed will lead to a crash. And as far as he’s concerned, crashing while overreaching is a fruitless way to learn.

“Well, it’s not that I’m trying to not crash, I’m on the limit,” Marini says about his approach. “But I feel my bike very well every time, and also I like an easy bike to ride… it’s never easy, but [a bike] that I can feel the front better. So, every time I feel I’m on the limit and I try to avoid a mistake. But I push to arrive at the limit every time.

“So, every lap that I’m doing in qualifying, in practice is like this. So, I arrive at a race with a lot of data, with a lot of feelings and feedback from the practice that I know where the limit is in more or less every corner and that’s it. But I don’t know why other riders crash, because if you arrive at the end of a race you gain more data and more experience for next season because at the end during practice you just make six, seven laps in a row. You never do more.”

Marini's size and stature has often hindered him in MotoGP

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One issue that hinders Marini is his weight. His tall frame makes him the heaviest rider on the grid now, in a series where the minimum weight of the bike minus the rider must be 157kg. At present, there is no minimum weight limit for a rider in the premier class.

Marini has been on a crusade this year to raise this issue, as he has noticed the negative effects of his weight – namely, how much he is working the rear tyre under acceleration. It hasn’t stopped him from achieving strong results in 2022, but with the margins so fine now in MotoGP, it is a natural barrier that could negatively affect him in his pursuit of regular podium appearances.

He spoke at length about this, noting that his current weight is the absolute limit it can be before he starts to lose muscle strength. This is an issue that long plagued Danilo Petrucci during his tenure in the class.

For Marini “having a weight limit is something that is fair. It’s not for trying to disadvantage smaller riders – nobody wants a minimum weight limit that is so high. We just want something that can level things a bit more and give everybody the same possibility to fight for victory.”

This will be a case that will be argued for some time in safety commission meetings, no doubt, but Marini isn’t using this as a crutch heading into the winter. For 2023, he will continue with the 2022 bike – something he admits is “not an advantage”, but notes that Ducati won’t make major strides with its GP23 and that the support from the marque is there regardless of what bike you are on if the results are there. As such, he knows the early rounds of 2023 – much in the same way Bastianini took advantage in the opening races of 2022 – offer him a big opportunity.

"The comparison has never happened because it’s impossible to compare. What Vale did in his career is something incredible that nobody will do something similar to what he has done, because also it’s a different period" Luca Marini

Inevitably, though, the elephant in the room will always remain for Marini. He is Valentino Rossi’s brother. As far as some are concerned, he will only be in MotoGP because the Doctor has ordered it. That’s a lazy assumption, however. For him, people can say whatever they like – there is no pressure, and there is no comparison.

“No, sincerely this doesn’t change so much,” he says when asked if being Rossi’s brother at the VR46 team adds pressure. “The comparison has never happened because it’s impossible to compare. What Vale did in his career is something incredible that nobody will do something similar to what he has done, because also it’s a different period.

“Now it’s impossible to win 10 races in a row because the level is too high, it’s too much, everything is at an unbelievable level, the 24 riders in MotoGP are incredible, the bikes are fantastic, and every rider can win a race. So, it’s not possible to make a comparison. So, for me there is no more pressure. The riders with pressure are here to win, because they are here for this because it is difficult to win every Sunday.”

The Italian has made steady progress in his two years in MotoGP, going from the fringes of the points to a regular top 10 contender

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Has Marini been offered more of a chance than some because of his familial ties? Maybe. Has he proven to be his own man? Absolutely.

The 25-year-old is one of MotoGP’s most articulated and wisest riders at the moment, and will no doubt prove to be a tremendous ambassador for the series going forward. He’s nothing like his brother, and that’s OK.

Because Marini has made steady progress in 2022 under difficult circumstances and is on course for 2023 to be a breakout campaign for the Italian. Maybe then, onlookers will finally give him his due.

What can Marini produce in 2023?

Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images