Exclusive: LCR deliver update on future as a Honda satellite team

While much speculation has been focussed on the future machinery of Pramac and VR46, LCR is the other satellite MotoGP team out of contract with its manufacturer at the end of this season.

But having run Honda machinery since joining the premier class (with Casey Stoner) in 2006 - and given current LCR rider Johann Zarco is only in the first year of a two-year (HRC) contract - a change seems unlikely.

Nevertheless, KTM made a “friendly phone call” to LCR last year, as the Austrian factory sought to try and secure more RC16s on the grid.

“I replied that I had signed a three-year contract with Honda that will expire at the end of next year [2024],” LCR boss Lucio Cecchinello revealed at the time, adding:

"I've been with Honda for 18 years, it's clear it would be difficult for me to leave. I feel like a Honda man."

But what is the current status of the LCR-Honda contract talks for 2025?

An LCR spokesperson told Crash.net that ‘during the upcoming weeks’ Cecchinello will ‘approach it with HRC’.

If HRC failed to reach a new agreement with LCR, it would presumably need to move Zarco alongside Luca Marini at the factory Repsol Honda team to see out the second year of his contract. 

Like Zarco, Marini has signed with HRC until the end of 2025 but their team-mates - Takaaki Nakagami (LCR) and Joan Mir (Repsol) - are out of contract at the end of this season.