Oli Bayliss will ride for Ducati outfit Barni Racing Team in next year’s Supersport World Championship.
The 18-year-old has been signed 20 years after father Troy won the first of three Superbike World Championship titles, all with Ducati.
The international call-up represents a continuation of Bayliss’s progression in the sport, after achieving a first Australian Superbike Championship race win at Hidden Valley in June.
“I’m really happy to announce that I will be racing for Barni Racing Team in the World Supersport Championship on the Ducati Panigale V2,” he said.
“I’ve finished my school programme, which means I can now put my focus completely on racing motorbikes, training and only that.”
Troy added, “Oli has been brought up around racing, 2021 has been his first year on Ducati V4 R in the ASBK, and taking the win in Darwin earlier this year came sooner than we thought.
“I think the move to Barni Racing Team is a great opportunity; I hope he enjoys the V-twin as much as I did.”
Speaking on the announcement, Ciabatti remarked, “We are really pleased and excited that Oli will be debuting in World Supersport next year with the new Panigale V2 and Barni Racing Team.
“The Bayliss family and Ducati have always been linked very strongly and we have recently launched the V2 Bayliss Replica special version to celebrate Troy’s first world title with Ducati 20 years ago.
“Now, the tradition continues with Oli, and we are really happy about that.”
Barni was also eager to gets its hands on Bayliss, who will share the stable with its WorldSBK rider Luca Bernardi.
“In 2022 we want to focus on young talents who can travel along together with us for a while,” explained team principal Marco Barnabo.
“We want to help young riders to be, in the future, the next champions both in Supersport and Superbike.
“That’s why, when the opportunity to sign with Oliver for the Supersport Championship came, we immediately decided to take it in agreement with Ducati.
“Luca Bernardi is 20 years old; Oli is 18. We’ve never had such a young team, but I think this is the right time for this choice.
“For the first time we’ll be on track with two bikes both in WorldSSP and WorldSBK and at the beginning we won’t focus on results, but only on the growth of these two young riders.
“We were the first team to believe in bringing Ducati back to Supersport with the Panigale V2, and we’re very proud to see the interest arising around this bike and this championship.”
As Barnabo noted, 2022 marks the return of Ducati to WorldSSP after almost a decade-and-a-half away, following changes to technical regulations.
Bayliss senior won his latter WorldSBK titles in 2006 and 2008, as well as taking a victory in the season-ending 2006 Valencia Grand Prix for Ducati’s factory MotoGP team.
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