Will WSBK champ Bulega have his revenge in MotoGP?

Nicola Bulega secured the 2026 World Superbike crown last weekend, after one of the most dominant displays in the championship’s four decades.

So now the 26-year-old Italian can fully focus on his next target – winning the 2027 MotoGP title. If Bulega reaches that goal, he will make history by becoming the first WSBK king to wear the MotoGP crown.

History tells us that moving from MotoGP to WSBK is an easier journey than going from WSBK to MotoGP. MotoGP race winners Max Biaggi, John Kocinski and Carlos Checa all traded places to become WSBK kings, whereas the only WSBK race winner to win the MotoGP title is Mick Doohan.

Indeed, this year’s World Superbike and World Supersport grids are packed with MotoGP and Moto2 refugees, who tried and failed (for whatever reason!) to fully make it in the prototype championship.

Bulega is one. After winning the 2015 Moto3 junior world championship and joining Valentino Rossi’s VR46 outfit, he spent six years in Moto3 and Moto2 without winning a single race and scoring only two podiums. Hence his decision to step down to World Supersport in 2022.

Other MotoGP refugees include Bulega’s Ducati team-mate, Iker Lecuona, BMW’s Miguel Oliveira and Danilo Petrucci, Yamaha’s Andrea Locatelli and Xavi Vierge, Honda’s Jake Dixon and Somkiat Chantra, and privateers Lorenzo Baldassarri, Alvaro Bautista and Remi Gardner. World Supersport is the same: Albert Arenas, Valentin Debise, Jaime Masia, Can Öncü, Tom Booth-Amos, Jeremy Alcoba, Peter Ottl and so on.

However, Bulega has a unique chance next year. While dominating WSBK, the 2023 World Supersport champion has been Ducati’s lead 850cc MotoGP test rider, so when MotoGP’s new tech era starts next spring, he will have spent much more time on a Pirelli-equipped 850 than anyone else, all the time moulding the bike and tyres to his preferences.

Some MotoGP riders are complaining that Bulega will have an unfair advantage next year, but then racing is never fair. And Bulega has every right to use all the tools at his disposal to make the most of that advantage, which will be at its greatest during the early races of 2027.

“It’s fantastic, because when I left the MotoGP paddock I was in the worst moment in my career,” Bulega told TNT Sports recently. “When I moved to the Superbike paddock with Aruba Ducati, they gave me back my smile, so for me it’s fantastic to come back to the MotoGP paddock after some years and have my revenge.”

The fact that the WSBK champ is being so strongly touted as a candidate for the MotoGP title tells us something else: that the machinery in the two championships has never been closer.

Back in MotoGP’s two-stroke 500cc era, the motorcycles in each championship could hardly have been more different. Thus it was mostly a nightmare for WSBK riders to fully adapt.

Now they are very similar: from next year both will make around 250 horsepower and the difference in minimum weight isn’t huge – 153 versus 168 kilos. When WSBK started, the difference in weight was at least twice that.

Which begs the question: why are motorcycling’s two major world championships so similar?

I have no doubt that their new owner, Liberty Media, is right now asking the exact same question.

When Liberty bought MotoGP and WSBK from owner Dorna last year, it published detailed financial results, which revealed that around 95% of Dorna’s profits come from MotoGP, while the rest came from WSBK, Road to MotoGP series and so on.

So let’s guess that WSBK represents three to four percent of total profits. Most likely its running costs are more than that. So what exactly is the point of WSBK for a company like Liberty, which is only here to make money?

Could Liberty shut down WSBK? Of course it could, which would be a disaster for motorcycle racing, because whatever the championship’s current situation, it’s an important part of the sport’s ecosystem for riders, teams, mechanics and so on.

Perhaps Liberty will ask a different question. If the machinery in both championships is so similar, with similar performance (both Moto2 and Moto3 will soon be powered by road bike engines), why does MotoGP use insanely expensive prototype machines when it could use pimped-up road bikes?

Liberty spent its first few months as MotoGP owner fighting with the manufacturers over money. Quite rightly, Aprilia, Ducati, Honda, KTM and Yamaha wanted a better cut of MotoGP profits, because, after all, they provide the championship’s hardware.

Under the deal signed a few months ago, Liberty pays out around £60 million each season to the factory and independent teams. That’s roughly £21 million to the five factory teams, £25 million to the six indie squads and an extra £15 million to the factories for supplying bikes to indie teams.

That’s a lot of money for motorcycles that go around the racetrack at pretty much the same speed as MotoGP bikes, while looking and sounding very much like MotoGP bikes.

Liberty bosses – unless they’re not as bright as they should be – must surely be asking themselves the same kind of questions. Because if they replaced MotoGP bikes with WSBK bikes they’d save themselves 40 to 50 million a year.

If Liberty doesn’t do that, there’s another question that needs asking: what exactly is the point of World Superbike, beyond giving riders a chance as they climb the ladder to MotoGP or descend the ladder afterwards?

Because the championship has completely lost sight of what it’s supposed to be. The founding idea and whole point of superbike racing is that you race what motorcyclists ride on the road. That’s why superbike racing was such a roaring success in its early years, because fans flocked to racetracks to watch pro-riders do crazy things with the same bikes they’d ridden to the circuit.

Modern WSBK is arse about face. Instead of racing what motorcyclists ride on the road, the grid is full of motorcycles that are essentially road versions of MotoGP bikes. Which no one buys anymore.

A road-going Ducati Panigale V4R costs a whopping £39,000, the maximum base price allowed for a WSBK base machine. That’s not the kind of machine that most motorcyclists can buy; in fact I’ve never seen one on the road. That’s why WSBK has lost its connection to road riders.

And a race-spec V4R from Ducati Corse costs around £175,000.

It’s worth adding that Honda’s WSBK base bike, the Fireblade RR-R, costs £24,000, while Yamaha’s recently discontinued YZF-M1 cost £23,000 and even BMW’s S1000RR-M costs ‘only’ £32,000.

Some might find it strange that the V4R’s base price exactly matches WSBK’s maximum allowed price. Just like some people might find it strange that all the new technologies recently introduced to MotoGP by Ducati – downforce aero, tuned mass dampers and ride-height devices – were permitted, even though none of the other manufacturers wanted them.

If you were a conspiracy theorist, you might think there’s something fishy going on.

What Liberty should do is make World Superbike and MotoGP different again by reconnecting WSBK to road riders. The roads used to be full of superbikes, from Ducati’s 916s to Fireblades and Suzuki GSX-Rs, but now they’re full of naked bikes and adventure bikes.