Luca Marini and Repsol Honda continue to seek substantial improvements in the competitiveness of the RC213V. This Tuesday, the rider was only 20th on the last day of preseason testing in Qatar, just behind teammate Joan Mir.
The Italian explained that, despite the setbacks, the work program was fulfilled and there were improvements… although he acknowledges that he is still far from where he wants to be: ‘In terms of physical condition, I was perfect. It was a tough day because we started very late – because there was also a red flag, there were some problems at the beginning and also Taka [Nakagami] went out on track with new tires and destroyed the tires with the sand on the track. So we had to wait a while. And then we tried something big on the bike, but it wasn’t good, so we lost a lot of time in the first hour. Because of this, we were a bit tight on the plan. But I think we tested everything we needed to test, we understood several things, so now we have a lot of data and we can prepare for the GP in the best way. It seems like we’re still very far away, but the feeling on the bike has improved. I’m satisfied on one hand, but it’s true that the distance is really huge – especially when we want to use the new soft tires, we can’t use them well’.
Regarding what he needs to work on the most, Marini was unequivocal: ‘The grip now. Using the rear tire better – on entry, in the middle of the corner, on exit. Now we have to focus only on this part of the bike because it’s where we’re lacking the most. It’s true that we also lack other things in some other areas, but now grip is what doesn’t allow us to be fast and strong with the soft rear tire in particular, but also with the pace on used tires. So we need to improve in this area, not just on exit, but also on entry because I was following all the other bikes, so I could see that they are stronger than us in this area’.
