Luca Marini finished the Catalunya GP in 17th place. The Italian rider is still struggling to have a good performance, but despite the results, he is confident that the Japanese manufacturer is making progress.
In a debrief, the Repsol Honda Team rider talked about the race and the sensations he had during it.
– Yes, indeed it was my best race today. I only had a problem with the front tire temperature because I was in Taka’s slipstream for more than half of the race. I was trying to overtake him because I was faster than him. I don’t know to what extent he was managing the rear tire, but I was feeling something better, more potential, more rhythm, but I couldn’t overtake him. He is faster on the straight, has a different specification on the bike, so at that moment, I was struggling to overtake him and he was smart to close everything, so he had a very good race. Yes, with the new updates, the rotation is higher. It’s one of our problems, but this track, rotation, is a problem for everyone. I think it was also a problem for Pecco, the rotation of the rear. We have to be focused and smart to understand in which area we need to work. In my opinion, we are doing an excellent job. We just need to wait for more updates or find more performance because, at least, I can enjoy when I ride the bike. I’m not feeling amazing, but certainly much better than in the first races of the season. Now I can ride, I can defend myself, and I can attack, which is great. But I still miss the performance. So we are waiting for that. Maybe in Mugello we can have something more.
He also added about the progress made so far by the team: “Yes, it’s not just the rotation, the bad part. This is the problem, we have to work on many things. So, it’s difficult, when you have so many weaknesses, to find the performance in just five races. We have to wait longer, because in each race we take a step forward. I think now the bike is better to ride. I don’t know, the feeling is much better. I can’t tell you more than this”.
