Michael Dunlop has paid tribute to what may be an under-the-radar partner following his victory in Monday’s Supersport TT race at the Isle of Man TT, praising Ducati for its decision to back him for success on a largely road racing-unproven V2 Panigale machine.
That decision paid off in forever linking Ducati to Dunlop's milestone 30th win at the event - and giving it a first TT triumph in three decades.
Ducati has, like many European manufacturers, een traditionally somewhat reluctant to get involved in road racing, especially compared to its Japanese counterparts, who have always seen it as a key part of their racing programs.
That cautious attitude has been changing in recent years both as the TT grows in popularity and as privateer teams taste success with customer bikes.
Ducati’s win with Dunlop at the TT comes only a few weeks after his fellow Northern Irishman Paul Jordan stood on the top step of the podium in the supertwin class at the North West 200, after winning onboard Jackson Racing’s customer Aprilia RS660.
Nonetheless, Ducati’s involvement with Dunlop for the 2025 TT still came as something of a surprise, especially when it emerged that he wouldn’t just be racing one of its bikes - but that he’d be riding the exact bike that Adrian Huertas won last year’s World Supersport championship onboard.
First experimenting with the TT as part of the new Supersport Next Gen rules in 2024 by assisting Senior TT winner Davey Todd in running the machine he took to two podium finishes behind Dunlop last year, Ducati has stepped up its support for 2025.
“Ducati was keen,” Dunlop explained, “especially with the V2, and they dipped their hand in it last year. They wanted me to try and win a TT, so it worked out well for me, too - because it’s another manufacturer for me.”
And, with Dunlop running his own machines once again this year, he admitted that the extra support from Ducati went a long way towards convincing him to park the long-serving Yamaha R6 that he had previously taken to seven Supersport TT wins in a row.
“Everything’s a gamble when you’re very consistent,” he explained. “When you’re on something for years and years and years, it’s hard to walk away from it - it’s like an old girlfriend you don’t really want but that you’re stuck with!
“But with the R6 we were doing it all ourselves, and with the next gen rules kicking in, it [switching to a Ducati] was a practical route.
“In fairness to Ducati, they’ve given me massive help, which is great because everything else has been out of my pocket.”
The win marks Ducati’s latest success in racing and really should come as no surprise given its domination of both MotoGP and World Superbikes - and one person who won't have been surprised about Dunlop’s success is the bike’s former rider Huertas.
“For sure it’s a really stable bike,” the now-Moto2 rider had explained to The Race earlier this year. “You don’t normally have much movement from it.
“I don’t understand really this kind of racing [road racing] because I’ve never raced it, but when they make the bike a little bit smoother I think it would be a really good bike [for the TT] because obviously on the race track it normally goes really well.
“I was really happy with Ducati, and I think the bike has a lot of potential. On acceleration it might suffer a little bit, but if they worked on the aerodynamics a little bit then I think it’ll be easy to go fast with it.”
