Source: Supplied.

Double Moto2 world champion Johann Zarco will remain at the Monster Yamaha Tech3 team for the 2018 MotoGP World Championship after a stunning start to his rookie campaign.

With laps in the lead, fights for the podium and already a visit to parc ferme as top Independent Team rider, Zarco is the highest placed rookie in the standings so far in 2017 by some margin.

“I am very happy to know that I will continue my MotoGP experience with Monster Yamaha Tech3 in 2018,” Zarco said. “At the moment I am enjoying an amazing debut in this category where I have learnt a huge amount and the team have now given me the confidence for next year, which is just fantastic. I want to say thank you to my manager Laurent Fellon, who has helped me at all times and also, thanks to the people who have assisted me since I started racing in the world championship.

“We can see that Tech3 is a great team because when we push, it’s possible to get a strong result. I am very happy but this is only the beginning and I will keep learning and growing so that I can regularly fight for podiums, and then once I am at this level, I plan to continue in this way for as long as possible. In 2018, the rules won’t change and I will have an entire year of experience so this will certainly help me to get to the top.”

Zarco enters this weekend’s Le Mans round of the championship sixth in the standings despite crashing out of Qatar, going on to take top five results in Argentina, America and Spain’s first European round at Jerez.