MGPN can exclusively reveal that Ducati are about to launch a new range of lawnmowers powered by the Ducati GP25 engine. We caught up with our secret Ducati source to find out what’s going on in the Bolognese grass-care department.
Q: What’s the story? Why is Ducati launching a range of lawnmowers?
A: Well, it all started when we got round to reading the fine print on Marc Marquez’s new Factory Ducati Lenovo contract. It turns out that his Spanish legal team decided to go on a siesta instead of spending hundreds of hours drawing up a new Ducati contract. They just got the high school work experience kid to fire up their dodgy eBay copy of Microsoft Word and do a search and replace on his old factory Honda MotoGP contract, substituting the word “Ducati” for the word “Honda”.
Q: Sounds reasonable. Here at MGPN we wouldn’t even have arsed ourselves with the search and replace, just assumed that nobody would read it at all. What’s the prob?
A: Ducati’s legal team decided to take an Italian industry-standard 12-hour lunchbreak every day for 3 months instead of reading the small print. We’d already signed the contract when we realized that it still contained all the Honda bonus clauses!
Of course, Honda are basically a huge lawnmower manufacturer with a small scooter design bureau attached. The Repsol Honda contract guaranteed Marquez 50 Honda lawnmowers for a podium, 100 for 2nd place and 250 for a win. And after the search and replace shenanigans from our donkey-bothering Spanish amigos, The Spanish Antichrist now has a cast-iron contract guaranteeing him 250 Ducati Lawnmowers every time he wins! Considering sprint races, we expect the total number of Ducati lawnmowers that we’ll have to send him by the end of 2025 to be approaching the double-digit thousands.
Q: And you’re going to produce them with Ducati Desmosedici GP25 MotoGP engines?
A: For the top-end models, we’ve got very little choice. We’d already built a warehouse full of GP25 engines when Pramac told us to vaffanculo, leaving a big surplus. Then both Marc and Pecco told us that the GP25 was a pile of crap and demanded to ride the GP24 this year. So we could either chuck dozens of GP25 motors in the skip or use them to power lawnmowers.
Q: Can’t you just scrap the surplus engines for a tax write-off?
A: Well, obviously on paper they’ll be scrapped for a tax write-off. But we can then make a ton of money by selling these “scrapped” engines on to customers. We are Italian, after all.
Q: Lawnmowers aren’t really your main market. Are you sure you can sell them?
A: Of course! Ducati customers are idiots! We can flog them any old crap with a Ducati logo on it! Hell, if those chumps will pay half their bike’s value every 2 years for a “Desmo service” then they’ll buy anything!
Q: But the GP25 engine has around 300bhp. Don’t normal lawnmowers have a Briggs and Stratton engine with about 3bhp, or maybe 5bhp if it’s self-propelled?
A: Sure, but the average Ducati customer has barely enough riding skills to control a 12bhp twist’n’go scooter. That doesn’t stop us flogging them the 215bhp Panigale V4!
Q: Has Ducati ever produced a lawnmower before?
A: Actually, yes. Back in the 70’s, after our 28th bankruptcy, we were briefly owned by the younger son of an Italian lawnmower manufacturing dynasty. He got us into lawnmower design.
Naturally, we immediately went bankrupt.
Q: Ducati is leading MotoGP in the field of aerodynamics. Can this transfer over to the lawnmower side of the business?
A: Of course. 30 Euros worth of fibreglass wings will have no effect whatsoever at lawnmowing speeds, but the aero on our Panigale V4 has no effect whatsoever at the speeds that our motorcycle buyers wobble around at either.
Q: Do you plan on getting into any more non-motorcycle manufacturing?
A: Yes, boats! We’ve discovered that there’s a big overlap between the people who buy Ducati motorcycles and the people who buy boats. Basically, they’re idiots with far more money than sense. They spend most of their time buying machines that are beautifully designed, ludicrously over-priced, badly built, unreliable crap. Boat owners love stupidly powerful engines that explode after they’ve travelled about 120 miles, so this will be a great outlet for our time-expired Ducati MotoGP engines.
Q: Don’t a lot of boats have diesel engines?
A: Yeah, but we’ll just stick some of our old 1200cc V-twin superbike engines in there. The punters will never know the difference.
Q: Thanks for letting us in on Ducati’s thought processes.
A: Any time!
Actually, preferably not after 12.30pm, I’m pretty tipsy after my first couple of lunchtime proseccos.
