Redding: Once you're gone, you're gone

Scott Redding doubts he'd make a MotoGP comeback if he accepts a full-time testing role, or steps down to Moto2 next season.

Instead the Englishman - who lost his Aprilia seat to Andrea Iannone for 2019, after just half-a-dozen races on the RS-GP - is reluctantly considering combining Aprilia MotoGP test duties with a place at their factory-supported World Superbike team.

"They've offered me the chance to be a test rider, but it's not my first choice at the moment," Redding said. "I'm 25, I've got the fire to want to win, and I ain't going to get that riding round a test track on my own. 

"If that's the last option I've got, then OK, I need to take it and see if I can bring something after. But I want to race."

The chance to ride as a Aprilia wild-card in up to six MotoGP races alongside testing is also unconvincing.

"People say, 'if you do it, you've got a chance to come back'. But you've got no chance to come back. 

"Look at Pirro, does an amazing job when he races [for Ducati], but he's never going to come back. Or Kallio [at KTM]. 

"Once you're gone, you're gone, I just need to accept that. 

"Maybe if I can race the Superbike and be a MotoGP test rider, it could be quite interesting.

"Maybe the [Aprilia] Superbike is not the best bike out there, but I'm racing, and that's what I need to accept."

Former MotoGP racer Eugene Laverty has taken the Aprilia RSV4 to two podiums in the last three WorldSBK races.

Speaking after setting the 9th and then 19th fastest times in Friday's free practice sessions at Sachsenring, Redding added: 

"I've only thought about maybe doing that possibility last week, but I want to have something competitive to fight for victories, that's what my main target is. 

"And if it takes me somewhere in two years, so then maybe in the third year we can make another step forward, then I've got to take it on the chin, and take it. 

"But I don't want to be running around [just] as a test rider."

Redding also sees little point in a return to Moto2 - where he was title runner-up in 2013, before moving up to MotoGP - despite the upcoming change from 600cc Honda engines to 765cc Triumph powerplants.

"It's the same thing. It's not no interest. It's a great class and if I go there, there's a possibility I can win the championship. A possibility. 

"But there's all these young guys coming up, probably with the same talent, the same ego, the same fire to want to win, and they are 10-15kg lighter than me.

"And again, if I won the championship, would I go back to MotoGP? No. No one would take you because of your past. 

"So I've thought about it, but I don't think it's really the right way for me to go. 

"Look at all the guys who go back from MotoGP to Moto2. Excluding Elias, because it was a new class for everyone and completely different. 

"They're good quality riders, but maybe it's much more difficult than we think it is to take a step back. 

"No electronics, completely different tyres, different brakes, different riding style. There's so many things that you have to consider, that maybe it's hard to go back to it."