Danilo Petrucci well off the pace: what’s going on with the former Cremona winner?

For a long time, Cremona held special memories for Danilo Petrucci. In 2024, riding the Barni-Ducati, he won all three races of the Superbike World Championship weekend there. Two years later, riding the BMW M1000RR, he experienced the opposite: 14th place in the first race on Saturday, almost 40 seconds behind winner Iker Lecuona. Had it not been for the numerous retirements, Petrucci would have missed out on the points. His BMW team-mate Miguel Oliveira failed to finish after a crash.

For Petrucci, the weekend got off to a setback as early as the first free practice session. “We had a sensor problem in FP1. We had new components on the bike, and some of the sensors weren’t working properly. Unfortunately, we only spotted the fault during the session. From then on, we were lagging behind the others,” he reported during a meeting with SPEEDWEEK.com.

No feel and plenty of doubts

However, he does not believe the lost practice time fully explains the extent of the gap. “My feeling here is completely off. I can feel the front tyre slipping at the entry to the corners, which is why I’m entering them very slowly. I’ve got no grip and no traction,” Petrucci explained. It’s not down to a lack of effort: “I’m riding at my limit and pushing like mad. My best lap time was 1:29.9 mins, and by the end of the race I was doing 1:30.1 mins.”

He hasn’t found a way to compensate for the lack of speed with a different riding style. “If I push even harder, I can’t get through the corners. And if I try to ride differently, I’m even slower.”

Petrucci finds the gap “hard to accept”

The comparison with his triumphant run two years ago hits Petrucci particularly hard. “It’s sad. Two years ago, I led every session and every race here. Now it’s the other way round. That’s hard to accept, but I’m doing my best.” He doesn’t have a clear explanation for his difficulties: “Perhaps I just feel the limit here sooner than other riders? Lots of riders have crashed. I don’t know what to say.”

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Petrucci is also critical of the constant changes to his M1000RR. “We’re constantly changing the bike to improve. But I don’t feel any difference when something’s changed. It doesn’t get any worse, but it doesn’t get any better either,” he explained. “I feel as though we’re not operating within the bike’s optimal working range. Because when you change something, you should be able to tell the difference. But my lap times and my feel for the bike are always the same. Mentally, it’s really gruelling, because you can’t figure out which direction to take.”

Petrucci doesn’t consider the fact that Toprak Razgatlioglu was previously able to win races and titles on the BMW to be counter-evidence. “Of course, everyone compares it with Toprak’s performances. But Toprak simply used the bike in a different way. His style suited the bike very well. However, he’s the only rider who was able to compensate for these difficulties. Miguel and I are complaining about the same things.”

Is the new BMW swingarm part of the problem?

In Cremona, Petrucci will be riding with a new swingarm for the first time. Without having carried out his own comparative test, he cannot judge whether it is contributing to his problems. So far, he isn’t convinced by the new component: “I’d never tested it before. To be honest, we have some doubts. Van der Mark tested it, but I didn’t.”

BMW homologierte eine neue Schwinge

Foto: Gold & Goose

Petrucci will be leaving the Superbike World Championship at the end of this season. The fact that his final races are currently going this way is weighing on him. “I’m a bit sad because I’m saying goodbye to the Superbike World Championship in the worst possible way. But I ask myself what I could do differently. I really am giving it my all.”