After so many years of flirtation and rumour, double World Superbike champion Toprak Razgatlioglu is finally coming to MotoGP having signed a Yamaha deal that puts him on a Pramac bike for 2026.
As well as creating plenty of excitement, the news also raises plenty of questions about Razgatlioglu’s chances, the consequences for the rest of the rider market, the timing and for WSBK.
What’s so special about Razgatlioglu?
Even if you don’t follow World Superbikes, you’ll probably be aware of Razgatlioglu’s big reputation - especially given how often he’s been linked to MotoGP moves in the past.
A curiosity-quickly-turned-superstar after arriving to World Superbikes in 2019, Razgatlioglu traded Kawasaki for Yamaha (in slightly acrimonious circumstances), gave Yamaha a world title, traded Yamaha for BMW (in slightly acrimonious circumstances), gave BMW a world title - and is now committing to his biggest change yet.
He has dazzled with his renowned hard-braking style, with team managers and rivals alike marvelling at the brake pressure he's able to induce and control, but that style (which has led to doubts over just how well he can adapt to MotoGP) is secondary to the pure, indisputable results - and the showmanship this man from a family of stunt riders brings to his racing.
Once part of a WSBK 'big three' with Alvaro Bautista and Jonathan Rea, Razgatlioglu ascended as his two veteran rivals declined.
His last season with Yamaha, giving Bautista a big run for his money on what was widely seen as an inferior R1, was a harbinger of what was to come - a 2024 campaign with BMW in which he (aided by 'superconcession' status but more than contributing from his side) turned a mid-pack WSBK programme into not just the frontrunner it once was before, but a profoundly dominant force.
He’s also a huge sporting hero in his native Turkey. The chances of MotoGP returning to race at the superb Istanbul Park track again sometime soon have just hugely increased.
Factory seat demands and Yamaha fallout?
Razgatlioglu joining MotoGP with a satellite Yamaha might be a surprise given he and manager Kenan Sofuoglu had held out for a factory team seat in the past - and that the Yamaha bridge seemed burned when his original MotoGP tests with it proved unimpressive and prompted some recriminations from both sides afterwards.
But top sportspeople are (or should be!) pragmatists, Yamaha is a different place now and the Razgatlioglu camp has clearly cottoned on at last to the fact that satellite MotoGP teams are not the outcasts they once were.
The majority have equal specification bikes to their suppliers’ factory teams and many have directly-factory-contracted riders. Pramac’s already won a MotoGP title with Jorge Martin and Ducati, and with Yamaha on the up again it’s not inconceivable that it could one day repeat that feat with its new partner and the right rider and circumstances.
Razgatlioglu will be 29-years-old at the start of the 2026 season, so there was a degree of ‘now or never’ about this move, and this was the best immediate option.
The friction over the previous Yamaha MotoGP tests was more with previous team boss Lin Jarvis, who did not seem to be a Razgalioglu fan, whereas new managing director Paolo Pavesio worked with Razgatlioglu when he was a Yamaha World Superbike rider and is understood to have been vital to putting this deal together.
Wasn’t he being lined up by Honda?
The most recent Razgatlioglu to MotoGP rumour had involved Honda and the prospect of a big money offer to spend one year with (and hopefully transforming) Honda’s currently struggling World Superbike team before moving to MotoGP with it for the 2027 rule changes.
That didn’t come to fruition and the floating of Razgatlioglu may have been part of internal machinations in Honda’s WSBK programme and different factions’ efforts to secure a big star name.
On the MotoGP side, Jorge Martin’s surprise availability looks like it has become Honda’s focus, as in theory it only has one potential vacancy (currently injured works rider Luca Marini’s contract ends this year) anyway. A return to Pramac wouldn’t hold the same lure for Martin as a factory Honda deal given his determination to be a works rider now even though he won the title on a satellite bike.
Can Razgatlioglu actually succeed in MotoGP?
Expectations should be kept under control for 2026. Some in the World Superbike paddock rate their reigning champion so highly they think he could win on his MotoGP debut.
But regardless of whether a Pramac Yamaha even has a hope of that sort of performance in 2026, Razgatlioglu must surely see next year as a learning season.
He has no experience at all of racing top-level prototype bikes, which are stiffer and less forgiving than production machinery and less suited to the spectacular, front-end-biased and ultra-successful riding style he uses in WSBK. That style won’t work well with the current MotoGP Michelins either.
And the careful way Yamaha announced Razgatlioglu’s deal on Tuesday suggests his current BMW contract might limit how much he can do or say for his new employer within 2025.
Will he even get the traditional post-season Valencia test? Yamaha wouldn’t let him ride for BMW in the equivalent World Superbike test when he swapped teams at the end of 2023, so BMW may return the favour now and that will be a costly loss of mileage.
Given all that, just making semi-regular Q2 appearances would probably constitute a successful 2026 for Razgatlioglu - and that’s a lot less than his massive fanbase will hope for.
It’s all about the new MotoGP rules for 2027 and the series’ switch to Pirelli tyres then, though we don’t yet know how different Pirelli’s MotoGP tyres will be to its World Superbike tyres on which Razgatlioglu produces such magic.
Until that big reset, 2026 has to be regarded as a useful learning season when any success will be a bonus.
Who goes to make way for him?
Though Jack Miller’s Pramac Yamaha contract is only for one year, it’s his team-mate Miguel Oliveira who looks far more vulnerable.
Oliveira’s contract is believed to contain a clause that would allow him to be released if he is last of the Yamaha riders in the championship mid-season - and with his injuries this year meaning he’s 23rd in the standings right now with just two points, he’s not on very firm ground. Not that it’s his fault, as his score would be far higher but for the injury caused by Fermin Aldeguer crashing into him.
But in the small amount of fair comparison that was possible pre-season and at the opener, Miller was the more impressive of the Pramac duo and his performances since have certainly merited a contract extension.
He’s consistently the second-best Yamaha behind incumbent superstar Fabio Quartararo - which in itself should raise questions about Quartararo’s works team-mate Alex Rins, who’s never shown his old form since his nasty 2023 leg injury. But there’s very little chance of Yamaha not honouring the contract with Rins that it extended through 2026.
If Oliveira is out of Pramac, that probably means out of MotoGP - with no viable gaps on the grid for 2026 that he could move into at present. A return to the Aprilia ranks as it reshuffles without Martin is very unlikely to appeal for Oliveira.
What does this mean for World Superbikes?
As much as the World Superbike world is thrilled to see its star taking on the best of MotoGP, there’s no doubt that a rider of that talent and profile will leave a big void in its paddock as he’s been such a huge part of its storylines and appeal in recent years.
That might be compounded by his 2025 title rival Nicolo Bulega swiftly following him to MotoGP - as Bulega’s new Ducati deal includes 2026 MotoGP test duties that surely line him up for a 2027 series switch.
The World Superbike Championship has thrived on its narrative of stars grown in its own paddock and support series taking on MotoGP converts in recent years.
But take Bulega and Razgatlioglu out of the 2025 standings and it’s mostly former residents of the MotoGP paddock in their wake: Danilo Petrucci, Bautista, long-time Moto2 racer Andrea Locatelli, Sam Lowes, Moto2 convert Xavi Vierge, Andrea Iannone and Iker Lecuona, and only then at 10th in the championship comes Axel Bassani as the next true graduate of the production racing ladder in the standings after Razgatlioglu.
There will certainly be good and lucrative WSBK seats up for grabs, with BMW, Ducati and Honda all shopping in the rider market.
Some in the WSBK world hope or even expect for an influx of MotoGP riders in their direction. Right now though the interest doesn’t seem to be there - Miller for example having been linked with various Superbike deals but committed to staying in MotoGP. Johann Zarco is another who’s doggedly stuck to the MotoGP path when he could’ve switched. Superbikes may be a great career move for Oliveira now, though.
Lazy perceptions of World Superbikes as a series where it’s easy for past-their-best or never-actually-good-enough MotoGP riders to win titles do its level and quality of racing a disservice. But Razgatlioglu was a particularly potent weapon to throw back at that accusation.
