MotoGP, Brivio reveals: “Suzuki wanted Valentino Rossi”

Davide Brivio’s Suzuki adventure has come to an end and the Italian team manager has decided to move into the four-wheel world, as Racing Director for the F1 Alpine team.

And so we take a look back at his time in Suzuki, Brivio himself providing the MotoGP website with some interesting insight, including details of how he first came into contact with the Hamamatsu manufacturer.

"At the time, I’d left Yamaha and was working directly for Valentino Rossi. Sahara, Suzuki project manager, contacted me via Facebook: it was very strange because I didn’t really use Facebook", reveals Brivio. "He asked me about Rossi, what he was doing and what his plans for the future were. Suzuki wanted to return to MotoGP in 2014 and they asked me whether Valentino would be available to race for them”.

Valentino’s refusal

“I immediately spoke with Vale, but he told me he wasn’t very excited about the idea of Suzuki. He wanted to return to Yamaha. So I politely told Sahara that Rossi wasn’t interested. We carried on talking and he said: “If we were to form a team in Italy, would you be interested?” I said yes and my work officially began on 1 April 2013. The idea was to have a test period of a few months and then begin in 2014, but they told us it had all been put back by a year and that we’d start in 2015″, explains the Italian manager.

Mir’s arrival

Another key moment in Suzuki history came with the decision to hire Joan Mir. "In 2018 we had to decide on our 2019 line-up. The Rins project was working and so we had the idea to repeat the Rins experience with another young rider. I started to consider Joan Mir because I was struck by the fact he’d won the Moto3 championship by winning ten races.

"Joan had an option to go to Honda, but one chat was enough to convince him. I told him: ‘Forget the option for a minute, if you could choose between Honda and Suzuki what would you do?’ And he said ‘I would want to go to Suzuki'. He told me the bike better suited his style, physique and height. My eyes lit up and I said ‘He’s the man for us’.

Considering the results achieved in 2020, hiring Mir was clearly the right choice.

Translated by Heather Watson

MotoGP, Schwantz: “Brivio's position is not an easy one to inherit”