It was a happy and confident Johann Zarco that we saw after the Shakedown and tests in Sepang, with the new LCR Honda member considering that Honda is capable of fighting ‘at the front’. The Frenchman was tired from all the work done in the past few days – since the Shakedown – but saw a great improvement, also pointing out that the behavior of the bike in long races still needs to improve.
After the third day of official tests with all (main) riders on track, #5 started by saying that he did the best job possible despite not being in his best physical condition: ‘I was a little tired and we still needed to work on things with Honda, the plan was to try some things, confirm and prepare for the Qatar tests, so I couldn’t enjoy many new tires in the first hour with the good track temperature. At least I did my job the best I could and we got the information we wanted. I was a little tired.’
However, his work went well, with Zarco even considering that there was a big leap in performance… in one lap: ‘The improvements I made on the brakes during these five days… I had some tension in my left arm, so I couldn’t do many fast laps, but at least I tried to do a high-quality job and I am very happy with how the bike is responding. I feel that I can make the progress that I still need for myself as a rider and I feel that by making the right progress, more by doing it with the bike, we will be able to fight at the front. I believe that is possible.’ he continued, not forgetting some problems that still exist:
– Of course, now the bike can be very good in time trials, maybe the weak point is when we have to do many consecutive laps: the rear tire is having many difficulties and that can create problems in the race, but the ability to do fast laps with a new tire is something that Honda did not have before and they prepared the bike to do that and that is an important point they solved. We will see how they will solve the next point. It is another track in Qatar and, with another layout, it will be interesting to see the behavior that the bike will have there.
