Honda continues to try to make progress in MotoGP, as it is the manufacturer with the fewest points after two rounds. Luca Marini is still at zero points and is aware that, from his side, the first priority is to reduce the gap with his Repsol Honda teammate, Joan Mir.
The Italian explained that, through tuning changes, he sought improvements on the RC213V. However, he admitted that the shortcomings are in all areas – although the lack of rear grip is the most significant:
– We tried to have a better turning with the bike, better acceleration. Now the problems compared to the faster riders are a little bit everywhere, there isn’t a particular phase. For sure the grip in the rear is the biggest problem at the moment, so we are trying to solve this.
That said, Marini acknowledged that it takes time and work to mitigate the existing problems: ‘But it’s not so easy when maybe the problem is the hardware of the bike. So we need time to prepare some new parts. But we can play a little bit on the setting and at the end we find better solutions. We need to keep working like this and first of all reduce the gap to my teammate’.
In the Portuguese GP, Marini finished the main race in 17th place, thus achieving a better result than in the Qatar GP where he was 20th. However, he has not yet qualified in the top 20, being the last on the grid in Portimão.