Álvaro Bautista spent only two seasons with Honda in the World Superbike Championship, in 2020 and 2021. Although he didn’t achieve standout results, the rider left a mark on the Japanese manufacturer’s team.
Xavi Vierge joined Honda in 2022, and despite never being Bautista’s teammate, he has been able to benefit from his compatriot’s work — as he revealed in an interview with the GPOne.com website:
– Iker [Lecuona] and I were two young riders, experienced but not in this championship. So we started working with a standard base and then followed the path that Bautista had laid out, because we realized it was the right one.
Although Bautista left three years ago, Vierge says that the foundations laid by #19 remain influential: ‘Even today, we are still following that direction set by Álvaro, because he proved to be very fast, winning both before and after. We have tried so many things, we are working hard, and we are sure this is the direction to follow’.