Yamaha call on ex-WSBK racer to replace Dominique Aegerter at Cremona

GRT Yamaha has announced that Marvin Fritz will join the team at this weekend's WorldSBK Cremona Round in place of Dominique Aegerter, who continues to recover from injury.

In the week leading up to the French Round, which took place just over a week ago, Aegerter was injured in a crash while training on a motocross bike.

Alessandro Delbianco replaced the Swiss rider at Magny-Cours, and finished a respectable 10th in the sodden Race 1.

With Aegerter still recovering from the injuries he sustained before France, which included mutliple rib fractures and damage to his right shoulder, Yamaha has this time called on Marvin Fritz to replace the GRT Yamaha rider.

“First of all, I would like to wish Dominique a speedy recovery," Fritz said on the announcement of his WorldSBK replacement appearance at Cremona this weekend. "I cannot wait to be in Cremona, to ride for the GYTR GRT Yamaha WorldSBK Team and the Yamaha R1 in the WorldSBK is like a dream for me."

Fritz, who rides for the Yamaha's factory YART team in the Endurance World Championship (in which YART, with Fritz, finished second overall in the 2024 championship last weekend after securing third place in the Bol d'Or, which came despite suffering a tyre failure in the first hour), is not entirely new to WorldSBK, but it's been since the end of 2022 that he's appeared in the class.

"I’ll have to adapt to a lot of things as since my last wild card in Portimao (2022) things have changed, but I’ll try to enjoy the weekend and do my best, having no pressure. I’m looking forward to meet all the team, I’m confident it’ll be a nice experience.”

Fritz will join Remy Gardner in the GRT team this weekend, and possibly at the next round in Aragon, too, which itself is scheduled only one week after the Cremona Round.

“Firstly, I would like to welcome Marvin in our team, wishing again a speedy and full recovery to Domi," Gardner said on the announcement of Fritz as his stand-in teammate at Cremona.

"I think Cremona could be an interesting round. It’s a new venue and almost everyone will race for the first time here, so anything could happen. In May we enjoyed a very positive test session there, so I’m looking forward to hit the track as I’m confident we could enjoy a strong weekend in Italy.”