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The second day of tests was a particular one for the team Repsol-Honda riders.
Marquez was on the track at half past five in the afternoon, but after just five laps he was forced to stop by a short rain shower that held things up for a half hour.
Marc subsequently went back out on the track to put the sixth best time on the sheets at 1.55.196 in his 10th of 50 laps, thereby improving his personal best from yesterday by 0.703. Dani, on the other hand, entered the track a half hour later, finishing in 16th place with a best time of 1.55.875 in the 23rd of 48 laps.
“Tomorrow we will work some more on the electronics and the setup but I am rather pleased anyway. Not like when I am leading in the standings, obviously, but we worked well - the world champion explained, going on to say - At the moment our pace isn’t bad, but we need to do better. I don’t know yet if I’ll do a long run on the last day toward 9 PM when everyone will try to do it. It depends on what work we will have done. Today Viñales was faster than everyone, but we rectified a few things and we still have a day left. Where do I see myself in this championship? It will depend on the circuits. This is a track where a podium would almost be a victory. Why? Because there are a lot of acceleration points. In 2016 that was our weak point. Here there are not many slow turns, which are our strong point.”
The impression is that Honda, in any case, is working at 360°, without being too terribly concerned about pure performance.
"Actually, in Jerez I felt more at ease - Marc confesses - but in the last hour we maintained a good pace. The bike still wheelies in acceleration, but above all we have traction problems. In any case, we are ready to battle for the podium, even though this year it will not be possible to be the fastest on every track. We will need to manage points but obviously the target is to try to win from the beginning. Our base is not bad. Today we tried something that did not produce the results that we had hoped for, but we have something planned for tomorrow that we hope will allow us to improve.”
His teammate, Dani Pedrosa, is less satisfied.
“The rankings notwithstanding, today I did not have the right confidence and that is why I did not try for a faster time - Dani explained - Little by little we improved a bit, but the track was different yesterday. I tried an almost long run to try and understand how the bike would perform, but we knew that the pace would not be out of this world. Tyres? The race tyre will be the medium. We’ll be able to use the soft for the pole. We are at a better point than last year at this stage of the season, but there are still some areas where we need to understand more. We are still trying to obtain as much information as possible before the first race.”
