RiderTua.com – MotoGP rider from France, Fabio Quartararo, felt disappointed after the weekend of racing in Lusail. Yamaha is getting further away from its strongest rival, and Quartararo hopes there will be a quick reaction to improve this situation.
The 2024 MotoGP season got off to a complicated start for the Yamaha team. The results obtained by Quartararo and his teammate, Aleix Rins, at the first weekend in Qatar, were not satisfactory. While Rins still needs time to adapt to the M1 bike, Quartararo finished 12th in the Sprint and 11th in Sunday’s race. He was 4.5 seconds behind the race winner. This shows that there is a lot of work to be done.
Fabio Quartararo’s disappointment with Yamaha’s performance in the last race
Quartararo pondered what was happening, realizing that the gap between Yamaha and its rivals was widening. He expressed his disappointment, “We are still very far away and obviously it is difficult because I know my potential and know where I can be. We are already better than last year. We have improved a little, but Ducati, KTM and Aprilia have made progress further and faster than in 2023. The gap between us and the European manufacturers is increasing. Honda is also having difficulties, but I think we are in a worse situation.”
One of the problems Quartararo faced was the performance of the Yamaha bike in the early laps of the race. The M1 bike was not able to go as fast as desired, and Quartararo felt that the bike had lost its main quality. He explained, “The problem was that the potential we had in the first lap was low. We couldn’t go as fast as the leaders. I started the race very well, behind Espargaro and Acosta, but as soon as there was a long fast corner, we slowed down. This is “Our strength in 2021, I was able to overcome the Ducati’s speed on the straight, but now this is our weak point. We wonder why.”
Yamaha is also lagging behind other manufacturers such as Ducati, KTM and Aprilia. Quartararo could not explain why Yamaha was increasingly falling behind, especially in the Sprint race. He said, “After all, we’re still a long way off, but why can’t we go fast in the Sprint? That’s the question.”
When asked whether the current Yamaha is the worst bike he has ever ridden in terms of competitiveness, Quartararo answered honestly. He admits that Yamaha currently still has some improvements, but in terms of competitiveness compared to other manufacturers, Yamaha is getting further away from what it was before.
Quartararo’s disappointment with Yamaha’s increasingly lagging performance shows that the Yamaha team needs to immediately respond and find a solution to improve the performance of the M1 bike. With increasingly fierce competition in MotoGP, Yamaha must work hard so as not to fall further behind its rivals. Quartararo hopes that improvements will come soon so he can return to competing in pole position and fighting for the championship title.
