For initiatives on a global scale, this year we will again run the Yamaha VR46 Master Camp, which is held in cooperation with Valentino Rossi’s VR46 Riders Academy, to develop riders who can compete at the international level, and again send riders to compete in the CEV Moto2 European Championship. The burden COVID-19 has placed on the world is expected to remain well into 2021, but Yamaha will continue its racing efforts toward furthering our three main principles of raising the value of the Yamaha brand, incorporating technologies and feedback from racing into our products, and promoting the healthy spread of motorcycle racing.Īs part of this, we will work in coordination with our bLU cRU amateur racing support programmes run by our subsidiaries in countries around the world to continue discovering and developing young, promising riders of various nationalities and helping them step up through the ranks of racing. The 2020 season also included Yamaha title wins in the premier JSB1000 class of the All Japan Road Race Championship, the MotoAmerica Superbike class, the 250SX West class in AMA Supercross and the 250MX class in the AMA Motocross Championship. YZR-M1s swept the podium at the Andalucia Grand Prix and Yamaha continued to put up strong results throughout the season, with 7 wins and 12 podiums in 14 races. With the global COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, measures were put in place to prevent the spread so that various championships could go ahead, and Yamaha was able to compete in MotoGP as planned. In those 60 years, we have worked with a star-studded lineup of riders in our racing challenge, notching up 511 wins in total (47 in the 125cc class, 165 in 250cc, 63 in 350cc, 120 in 500cc and 116 in MotoGP) with 38 Rider titles, 37 Constructor titles, and 7 Team titles in all. As such, the 2021 season marks our 60th anniversary of racing at the Grand Prix level.
Our first foray into international racing came in 1958 with an entry in the Catalina Grand Prix, and our first full Road Racing World Championship Grand Prix season followed in 1961. began 10 days after the company was founded on July 1, 1955. The racing history of Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd.