Marquez “afraid” he’s lost early-season advantage
MotoGP championship leader Marc Marquez admits that Friday at Jerez has left him worried that his Honda bike has suffered a drop in pace compared to the opening rounds of the season.
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
The Spaniard, who took comfortable victories in Argentina and Austin, was just fifth in FP1, half a second off pacesetter Jorge Lorenzo - albeit he improved to runner-up behind the Yamaha rider in FP2.
The general consensus suggested that Honda would be in for a tougher time at Jerez and the European venues that follow it, and for Marquez, Friday has not dispelled those fears.
"[The track] is completely different than Austin, Argentina and Qatar, it's more stop-and-go, so the pitching is not the same," he said.
"We are trying to understand this and to find a pace for the European tracks.
"I was afraid about this, I start FP1 and I see that the pace was not the correct one, so we change [set-up] from FP1 to FP2, and it's much better."
Pedrosa giving up time "for free"
It was an entirely different story for teammate Dani Pedrosa, who beat Marquez in FP1 but was 1.4s off the pace in FP2.
"Not a good day," Pedrosa conceded. "One of the big reasons is the grip on the rear - can't get any good drive out of the turn, struggling with this.
"These bikes are so very powerful, as long as you keep the power on, the better laptime you get. As I cannot hammer [down the throttle], I am losing time on the acceleration, which was one of my strong points.
"We're giving time for free, that makes these gaps on laptime.
"Today I was not improving on the second practice and I need to find a way how to gain some more traction."
Additional reporting by German Garcia Casanova
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