MotoGP | Tour de force Marini: test at the VR46 Ranch and 2 tests in Jerez

Luca Marini may not have had the debut he dreamed of in his new team, the official Honda team, but no one can blame him for his commitment and determination. Since the start of the season, on March 10 in Qatar, where the Pesaro native found that his adaptation to the 2024 HRC RC213V was not going in the right direction, Marini has already visited the Jerez circuit twice to ride the MotoGP with part of the his team, who prepares the bike for him so that he can make the most of his days.

After signing for Honda at the end of last year, Marini faced his new stage in an official team with maximum illusion and motivation. The problems came during the pre-season. After a decent test in Sepang but normal for a rookie on a complicated bike in the development phase, in which he was always between one and 1″3 from the fastest, in Qatar in the second official test of the pre-season, Marini slipped to finishing 20th at 1″725 from Pecco Bagnaia, being the only driver who worsened his gap from the leader every day of the pre-season compared to the previous day.

In the Qatar Grand Prix he finished FP1 0″9 from first place, but in Saturday's practice he dropped to 2″428 and in Q1 over a second and a half off the pace. In the race, Marini finished last in the Sprint (25s. behind Jorge Martín) and in Sunday's race (42″. behind Pecco), in which he also finished 24 seconds behind teammate Joan Mir.

Marini immediately understood that he had to get to work, even if he had a technical “problem” during the race, he knew something was wrong. “It's obvious, because I was going very slowly, but there was a problem. I can't say what it is, but it was something simple, which can be solved immediately,” he said on Sunday in Qatar.

Last week, in conjunction with a private Honda team test with Stefan Bradl, Marini traveled to southern Spain to ride the RC213V, taking advantage of the new concession rules enjoyed by the Tokyo team in MotoGP. Both Honda and Yamaha riders are free to test as much and as little as they want on any circuit during the season, only while respecting a maximum number of tyres.

“Luca needs to ride and understand the bike, and the time to do that is now, not at the end of the season. If he reaches the limit of his tire set sooner than expected, it doesn't matter, whatever he needs to do is now,” he said. explained a team member to Motorsport.

“The best thing we can do at the moment is to keep racing, so obviously it's fantastic to go to Portimao,” explains Luca ahead of the Grand Prix. “It's a very different track to the one we started the year on, so I'm curious to see how Honda goes,” adds Marini, who admits he's working hard.

“We are developing the bike, working with Honda, collecting information on different tracks to improve. Our goal is to find a better feeling with the bike to be more competitive.”

In addition to last week's private test and the two days, today and tomorrow, that he has scheduled again in Jerez with the 2024 RC213V, Marini also had time to visit the VR46 Ranch last Saturday, and to spend the day with the brother Valentino Rossi and other riders from the Tavullia Academy to practice on the dirt road, as #46 himself showed on his social networks.