Has MM Admitted He's Human?

[Yorick]

On the starting grid Neil Hodgson interviewed MM and says "are you hoping for rain because you are the best in these econditions?"
Marcus says with a grin "I used to be"
And then afterwards in the studio they were talking about the interview, and they all says that Marquez was now much more humble and less arrogant. They'd never seen him like that.

Then this article...

Marc Marquez has admitted the mental difficulty of no longer being “able” to win races.

The MotoGP star rider is an eight-time world champion, six in the premier class, and is lauded among the best of his generation.

But a dreadful period since winning the 2019 title - interrupted by career-threatening injuries and Honda’s fall-off - have resulted in him making admissions that never felt possible.


“The summer break arrived at the best moment for me, the correct moment,” he told BBC.

“I was injured, I was empty in races. There were crashes. The rib was broken, the finger broken, the ankle…

“I took time to rebuild my body and energy. And I had time to prepare the second half of the season.

“I’m still not 100%, especially on my right leg. But it’s acceptable to ride the bike.

“When I had the arm injury it was a difficult moment, very demanding, four different surgeries.

“Now I feel ready to fight for victories but, for some reason, I am not able to do it.

“That becomes difficult on the mental side.

“Crashes, injuries, in my professional life this is the hardest moment. But my personal life is at its best moment so this compensates a bit.”

Marquez arrived injury-free into 2023 after incredibly battling back from a fourth arm surgery a year ago which might have ended his career.

But he crashed on the first weekend, injuring a hand, then had back-to-back weekends in Germany and the Netherlands where he was constantly in the gravel, and he withdrew from both grands prix.

Astonishingly after nine rounds of the championship, Marquez has yet to complete a Sunday race.

“All my career has been very sweet, flowers, very easy, a lot of wins and eight world championships,” he said.

“Then one day my nightmare started.

“It was so difficult. Three years of suffering.

“It was time to say: ‘Maybe this is the time to stop my career’.

“But still the passion and motivation is there.

“Some people around me said ‘it’s time to stop’. But most said ‘continue’.”

Many of Marquez’s problems surround his Honda - his team and fellow Japanese manufacturer Yamaha have fallen way behind their European counterparts, initially Ducati but now also KTM and Aprilia.

It has led to speculation that he could seek a new environment although, at Silverstone, he revealed his expectation to stay at Honda in 2024.

“Every year when I start the season it’s to fight for the championship,” he said.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s the ninth championship or the first. I will fight in the same way.

“But it’s true that, today, we cannot think about the championship.

“The reality is we are not ready to win. Not me, not the bike, many reasons.

“In three years I have completed just half of the races. Many injuries. It is time to rebuild confidence.

“Then I hope, next year, to think about the championship.”

[Beancounter]

What makes the Honda such a difficult bike to ride? Given his crash history I'm amazed he still wants to ride the thing.

[Supermofo]

What makes the Honda such a difficult bike to ride? Given his crash history I'm amazed he still wants to ride the thing.

Who knows, but they had a bike only Marc could ride and made it into something no one can ride

[Yorick]

What makes the Honda such a difficult bike to ride? Given his crash history I'm amazed he still wants to ride the thing.

Who knows, but they had a bike only Marc could ride and made it into something no one can ride

I'm not sure if they changed it. More that Ducati etc made big steps forward.

But Yamaha did make their bike slower. The lap times show this.

[Skub]

MM needs to get off that Honda.

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

It's not that the Honda is bad, it's that the Ducati is good and has very good electronics, Ducati have put a lot of effort in and are reaping the rewards.

[Yorick]

MM needs to get off that Honda.

He does with alarming regularity

[Beancounter]

It's not that the Honda is bad, it's that the Ducati is good and has very good electronics, Ducati have put a lot of effort in and are reaping the rewards.

So he's crashing because he's pushing it too hard, is that it?

[Yorick]

It's not that the Honda is bad, it's that the Ducati is good and has very good electronics, Ducati have put a lot of effort in and are reaping the rewards.

So he's crashing because he's pushing it too hard, is that it?

Yup. He only knows one way to ride Flat out, and that normally puts him in front. Not any more, so it's flat out and a bit extra.

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

It's not that the Honda is bad, it's that the Ducati is good and has very good electronics, Ducati have put a lot of effort in and are reaping the rewards.

So he's crashing because he's pushing it too hard, is that it?

Yup. He only knows one way to ride Flat out, and that normally puts him in front. Not any more, so it's flat out and a bit extra.

He's trying too hard on it, it'd be good for him to ride it to the best position it's capable of, and try and build from there, but he won't, he's win or bin mentality.

[ChrisW]

The Honda and Yamaha just aren’t racing in the same competition as the Ducatis, KTMs and even Aprilias. They desperately need a sea-change in their approach to the bikes.

I saw a blurry image the other day of Bradl testing for 2024 that suggested maybe Honda have done just that. We*ll see.

[Beancounter]

I always thought you can't teach a slow rider to go fast but you can teach a fast rider how not to crash but I guess not.

[mangocrazy]

I don't think it's as simple as 'the Honda is shite' or 'MM has lost his mojo'. Certainly the Euro bikes have made big steps forward, but both Honda and Yamaha look a bit rudderless. Fab Frog can't even get near his race times from a year or two years ago, and in that time he's got an engine with a fair bit more power. Honda are packing out the non-points paying positions or (in the case of MM) binning it trying to over-ride the thing.

I remember listening to an interview with Simon Crafar where he reiterated advice from a development engineer with decades in the MotoGP (and GP bfore that) paddock. It was 'don't listen exclusively to a World Champion'. What he meant was that WCs can ride round issues that lesser mortals can't and they will also give skewed feedback due to their exceptional skills. I think that is what has happened with both Honda and Yamaha in recent times. The number of riders who have complained about the Yamaha is quite long. Rossi in his last years couldn't get it to work, neither could Dovizioso and Vinales left in a very public spat because no-one at Yamaha would take his concerns seriously. Now both Rossi and Dovi were definitely past their peak, but you don't go from top 5 to mid teens overnight.

The same source (IIRC) also said that when developing an engine 80% of the engine's characteristics should be mechanically derived and only 20% should be down to the electronics. In other words you can't make a mental engine and expect to soften it with electronics; the engine character (drivability etc.) has to be mostly innate with a bit of electronic tempering. Try telling Honda that...

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

This is just my opinion, so feel free to ignore it, engine wise there's only so much you can do with electronics, I don't think any of the moto go bikes have variable valve timing, so that leaves ignition timin, fuel injection and exup type valves (you could have magnetically adjustable flywheel resistance, but I don't think anyone has done it), the engine is only going to make as much power as the mechanical design allows, and all the manufacturers know how to get the maximum power out of an engine. The electronics then try to make it a usable engine, the better the electronics, the better package it is, Ducati have got it very right, you can see the Ducati gets better traction out of corners, meaning it's accelerating sooner and harder, which means it's faster at the end of the straight.

The Ducati is a complete package with the engine and rolling chassis working together, the chassis electronics work in harmony with the engine electronics. Honda and Yamaha need to work more on the electronics, or pay someone to do it for them, Suzuki appeared to have a good balance, but were down on power in 2022, they quit for financial reasons, maybe Honda and Yamaha are feeling the pinch, or don't see Moto GP being that important.

[Yorick]

Motogp bikes have standard ECU

https://www.crash.net/motogp/feature/95 ... e-controls

[Supermofo]

Motogp bikes have standard ECU

https://www.crash.net/motogp/feature/95 ... e-controls

Weren't they developed using an ECU company that Ducati had been using though? I seem to recall something about that at the time. Honda had a really good system and had to bin it for something entirely new. Of course you'd hope that they'd have had time to sort that by now though.

[mangocrazy]

The standard Magneti-Marelli ECU was imposed for the 2016 season and Rossi reckoned that Yamaha missed a trick by not hiring M-M engineers, like most of the rest of the MotoGP grid:

https://www.crash.net/motogp/news/99066 ... andard-ecu

Dorna also specified a standard IMU (Inertial Measurement Unit) from the 2019 season onwards.

https://www.bikesrepublic.com/featured/ ... unit-2019/

[Supermofo]

Plenty long enough for Yamaha and Honda to sort their shit out then.

I sent my mate a text the other day with the constructors championship standings saying 5 years ago you'd have laughed at me if I said this would be the current 2023 standings. Even allowing for numbers of bikes the Jap bikes look shocking.

[mangocrazy]

It seems like Honda are determined to do it the 'Honda way', not getting outside expertise in, and to muddy the waters further they've integrated the race car division into HRC. Now that could yield benefits, but if they start treating a MotoGP bike like a car it could all go even more horribly wrong.

https://www.crash.net/motogp/news/10331 ... ssue-honda

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

I didn't know they all had to use the same Magnetti Marelli unit, seems a bit pointless to me in what's supposed to be prototype racing.