Fully engaged in a rebuilding process, Marc Marquez seeks encouragement in the little things that can allow him to continue improving a bike that is no match for the Ducati, KTM or Aprilia. In another period not too distant in time, any result for the Honda rider that didn’t see him on the podium would have been considered negative. This gives the measure of how things are for the brand of the golden wing, resigned to seeing its spearhead refusing to take more risks than absolutely necessary to avoid falling again and risking injury.
Since returning from the summer break, Marc Marquez and his team have followed their own path and have focused on working on the RC213V to find the best possible base. This Sunday, for example, he was the only rider on the grid to choose the softer tire option, in stark disagreement with the recommendations of the Michelin technicians. This forced him to be more careful in the first laps of the race, in order not to destroy the rear tyre, but considering that he was the best of the Honda riders at the finish, it can be said that the plan worked.
“There’s no secret. I approached the weekend with fewer risks with regards to the bike, as I did at Silverstone. This way it’s easy to score points. It wasn’t easy, but it’s easy to finish the race. For the whole weekend we managed the risk and from there we grew up”, said Marquez, who finished this morning’s warm up in last position as proof of this.
Marc Marquez, Repsol Honda Team
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
“Obviously I don’t like finishing within 23 seconds of the winner. But we had to change our approach, even if a rider like me doesn’t like it. We made a big change that went wrong and in the race we tried something very different. It’s a period of many tests, I have to be very concentrated”, added the eight-time world champion on the first Sunday of this 2023 in which he managed to reach the finish line.
It is not the first time that Marquez and his team, led by Santi Hernández, have contradicted the opinion of the technicians of Michelin, the championship’s tire supplier. If they had already done it in the past, when the titles were played, now that the goal is to get into the top 10, doing it is even less delicate.
“The soft tire was the best option for Honda. All the engineers who analyzed it were against it, but now our bike can’t go with the medium tyre. We have to opt for the soft compound, in fact the Hondas that mounted the media were very slow,” said the multiple champion.
“It was my bet, but at a certain point Santi had to convince me. When you’re so far from the leaders it’s very easy to get into a negative spiral, and I tend to get into it at many times during the weekend. But all the people around me they help me get out of it and move forward”, concluded Marquez.
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