Since his arrival in MotoGP in 2013, Marc Márquez has always won the World Championship except in 2015 , when he was fighting until the very end, and 2020 , when he missed the entire season due to injury. This year, therefore, is the first time that, while competing, he has not been fighting for the title at any time.
Despite being a completely new situation for him, Márquez assured this Thursday at the press conference prior to the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix that, right now, other motivations move him.
“Despite not fighting for the World Cup, I feel good. Of course when you are fighting for the championship you have a special energy and focus, but in the end I am competing for my own championship. I always look for different motivations to tackle each weekend, and when I achieve the goals I set for myself, it’s like fighting for my championship. That, for me, is the best way to progress in my recovery”, explained the Honda rider.
Márquez arrives at the second race at Misano after taking victory in Austin three weeks ago, a talismanic circuit for him, a victory that confirms that the improvement in his physical condition continues to progress.
“We’ll see. I arrive at Misano with the sensations of the test that we did here after the race more than with the sensations of Austin, which is a special circuit for my driving style and my condition, as it has more curves to the left. Actually, Misano 1 went better than we expected, I didn’t think I was going to finish fourth that race. But this Sunday will be different, we will try to take steps forward throughout the weekend. Being in the top five would be good, I would like to be able to be a little stronger here and in Portimao, circuits that turn to the right”, valued the Spanish rider.
Regarding his physical condition, Márquez maintained the usual speech.
“We continue to improve, but too slowly for what I would like. The process is very slow, coming back after an injury like this is difficult, even so I have achieved three podiums this year, but it is not the level of performance that I would like. However, what I expected for the end of the season is what is happening, being close to those in front every weekend”.
The provisional calendar for 2022 was announced last week, with a total of 21 races , the longest in the history of the series.
“We want to compete in many areas of the world. 21 races is a lot. If in the future we want to reach more countries, we will have to eliminate some of the current races. Reaching 21 or 22 are many ”, released the Honda.
“For me 20 would be enough. Next year 21, okay, but we can’t continue in that direction. We have to put somewhere the limit. I think Dorna agrees with our point of view. It seems very good to me to go to new places, but we will have to reduce races in other countries”, he added.
After his victory in Austin, Marc was accompanied on the podium by his telemetry, Jenny Anderson , who joined the team this year, being the first woman to climb a MotoGP podium to collect an award.
“It is important that in our sport, where most of the members are men, women gain more and more presence, not only in press or management tasks, but also at the level of technicians and, why not, as pilots, as has happened in the past. It is the first year that I am working with Jenny and the truth is that she is a very important person in the group, she is one more component of the team. He had never been on the podium and Santi ( Hernandez , his track engineer) who is the leader, gave him the opportunity to be on the podium, it is one more motivation to maintain the good spirit of the whole team”, argued the man from Cervera .
