Kenan Sofuoglu’s nephew gets 2025 Yamaha World Superbike ride

Motoxracing Yamaha has announced the signing of Tito Rabat and Bahattin Sofuoglu for the 2025 WorldSBK season, as the team expands from one to two bikes full-time.

Motoxracing gathered some experience as a two-bike team in 2024, fielding Alessandro Delbianco as a wildcard at Cremona, and then Luca Bernardi in Estoril and Jerez, both alongside the team’s regular 2024 rider, Bradley Ray, who will move back to BSB in 2025.

For Bahattin Sofuoglu, signing with Motoxracing means graduating to WorldSBK after spending the last three seasons in WorldSSP.

The Turkish rider began the 2024 season with the MV Agusta team, but switched to the Ten Kate-supported Yamaha Thailand team for the final two rounds, taking a best result of eighth in Race 2 at Estoril.

On his signing for Motoxracing and graduation to WorldSBK, Sofuoglu, who raced with the Italian outfit in WorldSSP300 in 2020 and 2021, said: “I’m really pleased to be able to race with my former team again. We had some really good, successful seasons and podiums in WorldSSP300 and now we’re back together in the [top] class.

“My plan is to be ready as soon as possible as I embark on this exciting new chapter in my career.

“I’ve started riding a production YZF-R1 so that I can build confidence as I wait for the first tests. I want to say a big thank you to Sandro Carusi and Yamaha”.

Tito Rabat has so far ridden exclusively the Kawasaki ZX-10RR in WorldSBK, but was dropped by Kawasaki Puccetti for 2025 when the Italian team signed Garrett Gerloff.

“I’m excited to join the Yamaha Motoxracing WorldSBK Team,” said Rabat.

“I think the Yamaha YZF-R1 has a setup that is easier to define than other bikes, which means even a private team can be competitive. Our first goal will be the top twelve, but we’ll see how things go during the season.

“I can’t wait to start the winter tests and compete in the 2025 championship”

Motoxracing team manager Sandro Carusi said: “Tito [Rabat] has been our rival in recent seasons and so I’m pleased that he’ll now be part of our team. We began working with Bahattin [Sofuoglu] in 2020 when he was part of our WorldSSP300 Championship team.

“Over those two seasons, we were often on the podium and I always hoped that our paths would again cross one day.

“This will be our first season with two riders in WorldSBK and so there will also be changes in terms of our technical staff, with new entries as well as familiar faces. I’m sure that we can have a really close-knit work group in 2025.”