MotoGP: Team Aspar, Honda and Nicky Hayden agreement made official

We had written it several times and now it is official. Team Aspar will race next year with the Honda Production Racer RCV1000R and the rider will be Nicky Hayden, on board from Ducati (his place will be taken by Cal Crutchlow). The announcement was made by the Team at Phillip Island, where the sixteenth stage of the 2013 world championship will take place on Sunday.

Hayden therefore remains in MotoGP and does so with a highly respectable team and a bike that impressed Casey Stoner in the tests. The first test will take place in Valencia, immediately after the last stage of the season. Here are the words of Jorge Aspar Martinez.

“It's great news for our Team to have the services of Honda and a rider of Nicky Hayden's profile. It is a huge step forward in terms of quality, prestige and image. We have grown a lot in a short space of time and we are all very excited about this new project with Honda. It's the house we started with in 1992 and I have great memories of that time. Our goal is to continue to be a point of reference in the premier class. I think the combination of Honda MotoGP Production Racer and Nicky Hayden will be a great success. We are thrilled to work with a manufacturer with Honda's history and a rider like Nicky, a world champion with enormous experience. It will be a big change for us, after many years of working with Italian factories, but we have high hopes for this new project. We are ready for the challenge and will give our maximum effort to ensure that our Team continues to achieve better results.”