It ’ s no secret that Ducati will be the sole bike supplier of the MotoE championship from 2023 , but until now we hadn ’ t seen any physical evidence that the bike actually existed . Could the team from Borgio Panigale pull off such a radical departure from their petrolinfused DNA ? Turns out the answer was yes with the bike making its real-world debut at Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli in mid-December . Ducati calls the electric motorcycle prototype the “ V21L ”, with the bike the result of the joint work of the Ducati Corse team and the Ducati R & D engineers , led by Ducati ’ s eMobility Director , Roberto Canè . The man behind the bars of the V21L ’ s maiden voyage out on track was Michele Pirro , a professional rider and Ducati test rider since 2013 , who was given the unenviable task of evaluating the technical characteristics and potential of Ducati ’ s first electric motorcycle . “ Testing the MotoE prototype on the circuit was a great thrill because it marks the beginning of an important chapter in Ducati history ,” Pirro says of the experience . “ The bike is light and already has a good balance . Furthermore , the throttle connection in the first opening phase and the ergonomics are very similar to those of a MotoGP bike . If it weren ’ t for the silence and for the fact that in this test , we decided to limit the power output to just 70 % of performance , I could easily have imagined that I was riding my bike .” As always in the sector , the most important challenges in the development of an electric racing motorcycle remain related to the size , weight and range of the batteries . Ducati ’ s goal is to make electric motorcycles that are high-performance and characterised by their lightness available to all FIM Enel MotoE™ World Cup participants . The focus of the project is , in addition to better performance , the containment of weight and the consistency of power delivery during the race obtained thanks to the attention in the development of a cooling system suitable for the objective .