Brad Binder: 15 years with KTM and now out of the picture? The fall of MotoGP's most loyal rider

Brad Binder has long been a staunch KTM loyalist, but in recent years we’ve been witnessing a decline...

Engines are full of stories that are sometimes hard to believe, especially when you look at a rider’s résumé. Brad Binder won the Moto3 world title, excelled in Moto2 as well, finishing as runner-up, and in MotoGP he became a solid cornerstone for KTM. But all of that, unfortunately for him, is part of the past. The South African, almost his entire career (even before the World Championship) loyal to the Mattighofen brand, has literally vanished in terms of results. In Catalunya he started from the pit lane due to a clutch problem, after the double red flag he put together a solid comeback race, but all of this went largely unnoticed and not only because of the fallout from the crashes...

You can’t help but appreciate Brad Binder for his dedication, hard work, and his ability to never seem overly dejected when something goes wrong, immediately thinking about how to fix it and bounce back. Talent, of course, is always needed: people tend to underestimate that world titles aren’t won by chance—how many of the riders who have competed in the World Championship from 1949 to today can boast a world crown? A very small fraction, that’s for sure. In 2016 Binder joined that ultra-select club with the Moto3 crown alongside the team of super manager Aki Ajo and KTM. The brand that followed him during his Red Bull Rookies Cup period continued to keep tabs on him even though in his first world championship years he raced with Aprilia and KALEX KTM (RW Racing GP), then Suter and Mahindra (Ambrogio Racing). His first historic podiums had already arrived in 2014 (no South African had managed that in 29 years!), and in 2015 the move to Red Bull KTM Ajo paved the way to the title, which came the following year.

In Moto2 it didn’t take him long to shine: together with his garage mate Miguel Oliveira, he elevated KTM’s chassis project in the intermediate class—a program meant to be the pathway from the smaller class to MotoGP, unveiled in 2016 and shelved at the end of 2019. In 2020 Binder stepped up to MotoGP after finishing Moto2 runner-up, and at his third GP he surprisingly took his first victory, KTM’s first as well. The start of a brilliant journey, you might say, right? Instead... We certainly remember Binder’s memorable win in Austria in 2021, when he risked absolutely everything by staying out on slicks in the rain that sent the rest of the grid in to change! More podiums followed, in 2023 he also won two Sprint races and put together his best season with 4th in the world standings. During that very year KTM locked down their loyalist through the end of 2026, confirming him as an immovable pillar of the brand. But at the start of 2024 came his last double podium (Sprint and GP), and since then Binder hasn’t been seen in those positions again.

All the ingredients were there to expect him, in time, among the headline names in MotoGP—or at least among the main protagonists—but unfortunately the story is different. We don’t like to think it’s “because” of Acosta’s arrival, but rather due to something within the Binder–KTM pairing which, looking at the data, has never quite clicked to be consistently at the top. Who knows whether the financial debacle also played a part, with halted or delayed developments that put a bit of everyone under the KTM umbrella in difficulty... The fact remains that there’s little talk about his future now, even if a few rumors persist: some already see him entirely out of the KTM project, others think he’s close to a renewal, some even suggest a sort of “rider/coach” role for the newcomers. In short, everything and its opposite, until the commercial deal with Liberty Media is signed and the 2027 announcements begin. What lingers, however, is the impression of a promise unfulfilled.

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