The unfortunate accident that Marc Marquez had two weeks ago, which occurred while he was doing enduro, will prevent him, among other things, from taking to the track in the decisive pre-season 2022 tests, which will take place next week in Jerez.
In these tests, the engineers of all the teams (not just Honda) will have to collect the latest data and comments from the riders who have tested the basics of next season’s prototypes. With this information they will work between December and January on the bike that will be brought to the track in the Sepang tests in February, where the riders will already have the bike with which they will start the season.
With Marc’s injury, Pol Espargaro he will have to take a step forward, take charge and take the lead in the development of the bike, a role not new for him, which he has already successfully covered in KTM, even if with the Austrian manufacturer it took several years to reach the goal. A first “sketch” of the Honda 2022 was seen at the Misano test, a bike that Marc Márquez described as “the most different Honda I’ve ever tried”, at least in terms of design.
In an exclusive interview with Motorsport.com, Pol Espargaró talked about the first prototype tested at the Misano test last September: “Personally, I didn’t notice much difference between the new bike and this year’s one, but this comment must be contextualized. This year we are suffering a lot in conditions of low grip and in the Misano test the grip was very high. So, putting the new bike on track for the first time at Misano is not the best reference we can have, and we need to be clear about that. The conclusions must be drawn in the worst circuits, such as in Barcelona, where we suffered a lot in terms of grip. We have to keep testing this bike and see what it offers us, it gave us some very positive things in the Misano test, but also some very negative things that we need to solve. I don’t think it was the definitive bike we will have now in Jerez ”.
Pol Espargaro, Repsol Honda Team
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
Clearly, the rider made his own requests to the engineers about what he wants the definitive 2022 bike to be like: “I’m a rider who needs a lot of rear grip. Sounds like a cliché, there are a lot of riders asking for rear grip, but I think few riders are able to do as well as I do with that grip. On the KTM, the more grip we had, the faster I was and the slower my teammates were. In those conditions I can drive faster and more comfortably ”.
“Logically, that extra grip creates other problems that need to be solved, but next year’s bike is very focused on this aspect, the one we are finishing with this year is very similar in geometry to the bike we will have at the beginning of 2022. . Personally I am already preparing and learning as many tricks as possible to be able to handle this extra rear grip. But I definitely need maximum rear grip to work, we had it at Misano and things went very well “.
Although it is only his first year at Honda and the results have come slowly, Pol claims he has a good relationship with HRC engineers, and admits that they listen to him: “Yes, they listen to me. It is difficult, obviously communication with the Japanese is not easy, but within the team we have Europeans who help us and who have more experience working with them than I do. Coming from KTM, the way of working with engineers is very different, you can’t even imagine it. The way of explaining things is very different, how they understand or interpret them, it is something on which we must work and experiment to be ever more united ”.
One of the supporting points for Pol this year has been his technical team and, above all, his track engineer, Ramón Aurín: “I am very lucky to have an excellent technical team, with Ramón having worked at Honda for many years. and that makes things a lot easier for me, but I admit it’s a lot more complicated than what I’ve experienced in the past ”.
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