On Track Off Road No.183

vIeWS FRoM The ‘19 RePSoL hondA LAunCh
one; Madrid opened a different
chapter for the team thanks to
Lorenzo. Here are three themes
we picked up from a brief visit
to the Spanish capital
1) don’t say ‘dream’
“I don’t like it. We’ll see [if it
is] by the end of the season…”
with that throwaway comment
Marc Marquez dispensed with
the grating ‘dream team’ tag
that had been immediately attached
to the 2019 incarnation
of the squad since Jorge Lorenzo’s
shock announcement at
Mugello last summer.
The truth is that Marquez/
Lorenzo/HRC is quite possibly
the strongest unit assembled
in the modern era of MotoGP;
perhaps only the duo of Eddie
Lawson and Wayne Rainey
come close in the stats and
A RADICAL SUGGESTION MIGHT BE THAT MARQUEZ HAS
TO ALTER HIS PHILOSOPHY TO MOTOGP, THIS WILL REALLY
SHIFT THE TILLER...
pedigree stakes. And the bike?
The third HRC rider – LCR
Honda’s Cal Crutchlow – may
routinely describe why the RCV
is so hard to race but there is
little doubt that the motorcycle
improved in 2018 and was not
quite the stubborn front-ended
brute that made Marquez one
of the ‘crashiest’ athletes in the
pack in 2017.
Marquez admitted that he’d
endured one of the “most
boring winters of my life”
with 24-7 physio after his left
shoulder operation. The Catalan
had less to comment on
2019 bike set-up with Lorenzo’s
adjustment to his third
crew and technology in three
years a slightly hotter topic.
“It’s still soon,” JL moderated.
“At Jerez [the second
and last winter test of 2018] it
was 80% and I could go fast.
I liked the bike from the first
day; an agile bike that enters
the turn well.” The 31 year old
was quick to credit the environment
he’d found also, “and
I love the team because they
have welcomed me with a lot
of affection.”
There are ultimately several
reasons (and it might be a
moot point) but ‘JL’ is no
longer a Ducati rider due to a
lack of belief from the Italian
management in his capacity
to deliver results. Lorenzo
seemed to hint that the ‘love’
was already in place with
Honda.
He was also aware of the opportunity
he has been presented.
The move to Ducati
delivered a new challenge and
a fat contract.
Now he has another challenge
and arguably one where the
spotlight is a touch brighter.
“Here is…‘another level’,” he
remarked. “I’ve been in other
teams with a lot of wins but
this carries more expectation.
On a technical level in
Valencia there were a lot of
people in the box, talking
about the parts on the bike.
All that experience will allow
me to extract the potential of
the bike. There is pressure but
it is not the same as coming
into GP and needing results
as a 15-16 year old otherwise
you go home. I just want to
pay back the confidence they
have shown me.”
For once Marc Marquez had
to - figuratively - stand a little
off stage-centre. Tetsuhiro Kuwata,
HRC’s General Manager
of Race Operations, underlined
that the factory team “is
always looking for excellence”
and credited Lorenzo’s choice
and arrival. “The fact that
he accepted this challenge
proves he is a champion with
high hopes.”
#93 was wearing his race
leathers for just the second
time (the previous day he’d
done the official HRC photos
in the same city) and seemed
to favour his shoulder now
and again during the forty
minute affair. Marquez may
be six-year veteran of the
Repsol Honda formalities but
this was the first time he was