After securing his main goals with KTM, despite not being able to win a race, Pol Espargaró made a surprising change in 2021 by accepting Honda’s invitation to race in MotoGP. The rider recalled how Honda is… Honda, and the fact that having Marc Márquez by his side was also important in making his decision.
After a few years with KTM, from the beginning to becoming a very competitive bike, Espargaró felt it was time for a change, and what better team to do it with than Honda and to be side by side with Márquez? His decision was made quickly, as he said in an interview with Motosan: ‘I spent those years at KTM, I worked very hard for them, we all worked hard. But there came a time when I said: “Okay, I was hired to take this bike to the top five in the championship.” I finished fifth, tied on points with fourth. I fulfilled my part of the deal and now I want to start a new chapter. And then Repsol Honda appeared. The factory Ducati scene, the factory Yamaha scene is the scene. But it’s not Repsol Honda. And even knowing that the bike wasn’t performing well, being next to Marc Márquez in Repsol Honda is amazing, you can’t say no.’
Still, it wasn’t easy to ride a bike that was already showing signs of being far from its most competitive package: ‘I suffered a lot, but I never regretted the decision I made. At that moment, I believed it was the decision I had to make and, if I went back to that moment, I would have chosen the same thing. Because I believed in that project, I wanted to do it. If I hadn’t followed that path, maybe I would have something inside me saying “Why didn’t you do it?”‘