From a Honda press release:

HONDA RACING INFORMATION

Daijiro Kato to Race Honda RC211V at Brno.

Reigning 250cc World Champion Daijiro Kato will race a Honda RC211V five-cylinder 990cc four-stroke at the Czech Republic GP, at Brno, on
August 25. Round 10 of the 16 round MotoGP World Championship.

The decision to enter a third RCV in the championship was taken by HRC in order to reinforce the structure required to supply the RC211V to other (non-factory) teams in the 2003 season.

Kato is an HRC contracted factory rider, currently leased to the Fortuna Honda Gresini team, will be part of the development team working on the RC211V, alongside Valentino Rossi and Tohru Ukawa.

HRC will prepare, and test their back-up system to run additional RC211Vs in the 2003 MotoGP World Championship, by running as many of the five-cylinder 990cc four-stroke machines as they are capable of at the moment.

Daijiro Kato, a 17-time 250cc GP winner, from Saitama Prefecture, was delighted with the news that he been given the opportunity to race the RCV.

The 250cc World Champion said of his new challenge. “I will change from 2-stroke to 4-stroke equipment from Brno, and I’m really looking forward to the race. It will be a great challenge to ride the machine that has dominated the MotoGP Championship so far this season. I will have to ride the RCV at Brno without any preparation, as the regulations do not allow me to ride the RC211V beforehand. But I will try my best.”

“The one thing I really regret is that I haven’t achieved any good results on the NSR500 for a while. I’m very determined to get a satisfactory result at Sachsenring, my last race on the NSR! I would like to take the opportunity to thank Fortuna, Honda, HRC and Fausto (Gresini), for supporting me so well in GP racing. I will give 100% to come up to their expectations.”