Repsol has announced it will back Alex Rins and Miguel Oliveira in the new Moto3 World Championship - and is thus aiming to win riders' world titles in all three grand prix classes next year.
Repsol, which has more than 40 years of experience in sport sponsorship, won this year's MotoGP title with Honda's Casey Stoner and finished a close runner-up in the Moto2 class with Suter rider Marc Marquez.
Both Stoner and Marquez will remain in Repsol colours for 2012, as will Stoner's MotoGP team-mate Dani Pedrosa (fourth this season with three wins).
Repsol's Moto3 hopes will be in the hands of two 16-year-olds, but both Rins and Oliveira are highly rated.
Rookie Rins is the reigning Spanish (CEV) 125cc champion, while Oliveira already has 11 grand prix starts under his belt and won the last two CEV races using a 250cc four-stroke Moto3 bike for the Monlau Competición Team.
Repsol has also announced that Alex Marquez, younger brother of Marc and runner-up in the 2011 CEV 125cc title to team-mate Rins, will enter 'some races' as a wild-card in 2012.
This will be combined with a full title assault in the CEV Moto3 series.
The last time Repsol participated in the smallest (125cc) class of grand prix motorcycling was in 2010, when the team won the championship with Marc Marquez.
Source: http://www.crash.net