Miguel Oliveira’s time at the Trackhouse Aprilia team ended at last weekend’s Solidarity Barcelona Grand Prix, but the Portuguese rider believes that one other departing team member will be a “huge loss” for the American-owned squad.
Oliveira spent one year under the Trackhouse banner, but effectively two with the team, as he stayed with it as it morphed last winter from RNF to its current guise, changing almost no personnel.
Wilco Zeelenberg joined the team back in 2019, when it was under the Petronas Yamaha SRT name, and stayed with it until the conclusion of this season.
The former World Championship racer, winner of the 1990 250cc German Grand Prix, had remained in his role as team manager at Trackhouse this year despite the arrival of Davide Brivio as team principal over the winter.
However, a restructuring of the team’s management will leave Zeelenberg out in 2025.
“Wilco [Zeelenberg] has been a great asset to the team, a great guy to work with,” said Oliveira.
“He’s been on the rider’s side most of the time, he has many times made the bridge between what we feel and what is really technical.
“Wilco has a lot of experience, and dealing with us he really understands our perspective. It’s always a nice guy to have on the team.
“It’s a shame that he’s leaving. If you check MotoGP teams nowadays, they always have this type of guy inside the garage, a guy maybe that was a rider, he’s retired, but really understands what we need.
“I think he’s a huge loss for the team.”
Raul Fernandez, who will stick with Trackhouse in 2025, said that he will feel the absence of Zeelenberg, but also of several other team members that are leaving Trackhouse this winter.
“It’s a strange feeling because, it’s not just for Wilco [Zeelenberg], we have also three more people on the team that will leave this weekend,” Fernandez said.
“It’s true that all of them helped me when I arrived to the team — the last years I had a really bad situation with myself, so they helped me a lot.
“I will feel strange when I arrive to the box and I don’t see Wilco or somebody else.”
