Frankie Carchedi won’t be Marc Marquez’s factory Ducati crew chief in MotoGP 2025

Marc Marquez will not only be joining a third different MotoGP team in as many seasons in 2025 but also working with a third different crew chief.

After spending his Repsol Honda years alongside Santi Hernandez, the eight-time world champion joined forces with Frankie Carchedi for a make-or-break switch to the satellite Gresini Ducati team this year.

Although yet to win a race, Marquez’s strong performances on the GP23 have paid off handsomely by securing the coveted factory Ducati seat alongside Francesco Bagnaia for 2025 and 2026.

But while Ducati often keeps rider-crew chief pairings intact during team changes, to aid adaptation to the new surroundings, it has chosen to place Marquez with Enea Bastianini’s current crew chief Marco Rigamonti.

The decision was reported by Motorsport.com and confirmed to Crash.net by multiple sources at Ducati.

Carchedi is employed by Gresini rather than Ducati Corse. The exit of Pramac as a Ducati satellite team is also understood to have impacted the manufacturer’s decision about Marquez’s crew chief.

Rigamonti helped guide Andrea Iannone to Ducati’s first victory under Gigi Dall’Igna in 2016, before moving with the #29 to Suzuki. When Iannone left for Aprilia, Rigamonti reappeared with Johann Zarco at Avintia for 2020, the pair continuing together at Pramac in 2021 and 2022.

Rigamonti was recalled to the factory Ducati team to join new signing Bastianini last season after Bastianini’s Gresini crew chief Alberto Girabola (previously crew chief to Andrea Dovizioso) switched to KTM. 

Bastianini and Marco Rigamonti won the 2023 Malaysian Grand Prix during an injury-disrupted season and are currently fourth in this year's world championship, one place behind Marquez and Carchedi.

Carchedi also worked for Suzuki, winning the 2020 MotoGP title as Joan Mir’s crew chief. With Suzuki departing, the Englishman joined Gresini last season and oversaw Fabio di Giannantonio’s dramatic end-of-year charge, culminating in victory at the Qatar GP.

So far this season, Marquez and Carchedi have taken three GP podiums, losing out on victory by less than half-a-second at Jerez and Le Mans, plus five runner-up finishes in Sprint races.

“It's something that I still don't know yet,” he said. “It will be Ducati's decision.

“Why? Because I'm arriving at the best team and best bike on the grid of the last two years, especially because they won with Pecco. So I know that Ducati, Gigi's staff, will give me the best persons to take the maximum from the opportunity.

“They took a big decision to move me into the official team, and they will give me the best tools that they think.

“The only guy that I asked for is Javi [mechanic] who is the one that followed me from Repsol Honda team to Gresini.

“So this guy will come with me. But the rest of the team will be a Ducati decision.”