Following his suspension at the Austrian Grand Prix for deliberately attempting to damage his M1’s engine during the Styrian GP, Yamaha announced the immediate end of Viñales’ contract last week.
The Spaniard will race Aprilia in 2022 and test the RS-GP for the first time next week in a two-day test at Misano .
Asked by Motorsport.com if he was sad that Yamaha couldn’t patch things up with Viñales to finish the season, championship leader Fabio Quartararo replied: “It’s one thing I don’t really care about. I’m focused on my job, so it’s something that doesn’t really affect me.”
“I’m not sad. I’m enjoying myself, it’s an individual sport and I have a new teammate this weekend. So I’m not really sad.”
Yamaha test rider Cal Crutchlow – who was initially set to replace Franco Morbidelli in the Petronas SRT during the British GP – will team up with Quartararo this weekend at Silverstone .
Yamaha wants to anticipate the arrival of Franco Morbidelli to its official team to replace Viñales for the rest of 2021 as soon as he is recovered from his knee operation and that he also fills that position in 2022 . Crutchlow admitted he knew how long he was going to be racing this season, but declined to elaborate.
Viñales’ old teammate, Valentino Rossi, who thought that Yamaha was going to be able to reconcile with the Spaniard to finish the 2021 season, ruled out moving from Petronas SRT to the official Yamaha team to close his MotoGP career.
“I thought they could fix the situation, but honestly I know the same as you: I don’t know much more,” Rossi said when asked by Motorsport.com for his thoughts on Viñales’ departure from Yamaha.
“Maybe they have other problems and for sure this movement will generate other movements. We will see in the next races.”
“Anyway, Maverick will get on the Aprilia as soon as possible. It will be very interesting, because it seems that the Aprilia is very competitive and Maverick is a very fast guy. It will be interesting for the second part of the season.”
“We have to find out who is going to the official team. Maybe Franco. And who is going to be my teammate too.”
“I think I will continue here at Petronas until the end of the season,” he added.
(Click on the image to see the photos of Fabio Quartararo’s 2021 season in MotoGP)
