The British rider, who retired at the end of last season and is part of the Yamaha test team, will debut in the Japanese team’s official line-up at his home race at Silverstone , teaming up with the championship leader, Fabio Quartararo , after Yamaha has signed him up for the English weekend and is awaiting an official announcement.
Crutchlow was claimed by Petronas-Yamaha to replace the injured Franco Morbidelli , who underwent surgery on June 25 and was initially set to miss at least three races, both in Austria and the British weekend.
After racing at the Red Bull Ring with Morbidelli ‘s bike for the Petronas team, Crutchlow will make the jump to the factory line-up in a week with an official M1, different from the one used in the previous two races.
Crutchlow, who has worked for the last two weeks with Ramón Forcada in the Petronas garage, will meet again with Silvano Galbusera , test team technician and Viñales chief mechanic since the beginning of June, when Yamaha fired Esteban García and placed him in its place on the side of the Viñales garage.
For Crutchlow, who made his MotoGP debut in 2011 with Tech3-Yamaha , where he spent three years, and who completed his career with LCR-Honda before retiring at the end of 2020, it will be his second experience in an official team, after racing with Ducati in 2014 a single season, giving up the second that he had signed for not adapting to the Italian motorcycle.
The 35-year-old from Coventry has expressed his desire not to continue beyond the three scheduled races as a substitute, so Yamaha will have to find a replacement for the rest of the season, either in the official team or in a satellite. , if Morbidelli makes the jump to the factory formation when he recovers.
Waiting for that to happen and for the decisions that Yamaha makes in this regard for the remainder of the season, the British Jake Dixon , 25 years old and who is completing his third season in Moto2 without having achieved any victory, will be the one who completes the line-up for Petronas SRT alongside Valentino Rossi in Great Britain.
Malaysian rider Adam Norrodin will replace Dixon in the Petronas Moto2 squad.
