Confidential Box: Honda, the last bastion

Honda, the last bastion.

With the confirmation of Yamaha’s signing of Luca Marmorini, it represents another step in the dramatic “de-Japanization” of MotoGP. First was the exit of Suzuki from the championship, then the loss of Yamaha from its satellite team, and now the arrival of the second largest motorcycle manufacturer in the world by an Italian racing engineer. Some may see this as heresy, but Marmorini is one of those carrots that Yamaha needs to show Fabio Quartararo to convince him to continue with them. A very interesting carrot, by the way. Specializing in engines and electronics, Marmorini worked at Ferrari before he was hired by Toyota to build its engines for F1, then he returned to Ferrari, to work at Renault. That is, it is Marmorini who performs it, as a castizo would say. They tell me that at Yamaha he will be in charge of finding the “vitamins” lacking in Yamaha’s 4-in-line engine, and he will do so by working in Europe. It was a real revolution for me that Yamaha took this step where they somehow admitted that “at home” they couldn’t find the way to make their machine competitive. This is the same thing KTM did last year when it put Fabiano Sterlacchini, a former Ducati, at the head of its MotoGP project … Gigi Dall’Igna in Ducati, Romano Albesiano in Aprilia, Sterlacchini in KTM or Marmorini at Yamaha … The competition Italian engineers manage four of the five MotoGP projects; only Honda is resistant to the eye-catching transalpine roller of competition engineers.

Hit the stats!

This morning, before the German GP starts, based on statistics from the Sachsenring, we wonder if this weekend will maintain the dynamics that have governed the German circuit since the introduction of MotoGP 20 years ago. One dynamic said it was an enemy track for Ducati, while for Honda it turned out to be the opposite. Well, one day of practice is enough to show again that statistics are the most imperfect in math. At the end of the day, three Ducati topped the provisional classification, five among the top six and seven among the nine fastest riders. This isn’t the first time massive dominance this season, as with Austin and Mugello, Ducati has qualified five of its bikes to the first five positions on the grid, but doing so on its taboo circuit shows that the brand of Italy not only has the largest number of bikes on the MotoGP grid, but so far has the most competitive bikes. Now it is necessary for their pilots to confirm this on race Sunday. As for Honda, their best rider finished 12th on the day.

The voice of the fans.

The Motorsport Network, in support of DORNA, has launched a global survey of MotoGP fans who should collect their expectations, “what they like or don’t like, and what they value most about MotoGP”, which reproduced Carmelo’s verbatim Ezpeleta words in the official statement. For me it was a good initiative, it was necessary to re -launch the MotoGP product that after the pandemic had lost speed of travel. An initiative developed a few years ago by new F1 managers, who, as DORNA will do, have also turned to Nielsen Sport for analysis of the data collected. From there they already knew how to spin their product, not so much on the dance floor but outside, which is where they did it in this successful show today. As I said, for me it was a positive, successful initiative, but I frowned that DORNA circumscribed its study to a particular communication conglomerate, and if the idea came from said group, which is officially associated with its initiative. Why not take advantage of their own platforms, where MotoGP fans are supposed to gather, to poll the fans? … I’m naturally skeptical.