The Honda rider said on Thursday ahead of the British Grand Prix that he was coming into this weekend with a lot of energy and no discomfort from his injured shoulder. However, a terrifying crash on Friday in FP1 brought the Spaniard back to the harsh reality of the physical suffering he has been suffering since July last year, when he was injured in Jerez.
“I said on Thursday that this weekend I felt energized and undisturbed. In FP1 I was able to drive as I wanted, but I crashed and, one more race, we are going to have to come out bruised”, he lamented
“It is being hard and difficult. You have to accept it and understand that I can’t always ride naturally. When I do it I make a lot of mistakes, I have to go finer and be more precise and that takes away from us a plus. But we are getting better and better on different circuits. What I don’t want is what happened at the beginning of the season, the ups and downs, that in one circuit it was very fast and others very slow. I prefer to be stable and not suffer, and at the moment we are achieving it”, explained the Honda rider.
Márquez injured his right eye in his fall on Friday and in order to recover he suspended his meetings with the press, so he had not yet been able to explain the fall.
“My eye feels like it has conjunctivitis, but now it doesn’t bother me as much. Yesterday it was very bad, I cried a lot, but tomorrow it will be better, “he explained first.
“I have already discounted the number of hard falls I have suffered in my career. It was strange, I was coming out of the box and it was the first lap, maybe I parted a hair too much. It was weird because I was going a little slower than usual at that point. The good thing is that nothing happened, although I was quite scared”, he said before placing that crash in his ranking of strongest falls: “The one in Jerez at turn 7 this year was worse than this one, so it is the second worst of the year, but possibly the third worst of my career, because that honor goes to Mugello 2013”, he recalled.
That the Honda works on this track was confirmed by Pol Espargaró’s result, with his first pole position of the season.
“Pol has always been very fast on one lap. Since he has arrived at Honda he has always made time. This weekend we have both been at the top and we can get a good result”, celebrated Marc.
“He has celebrated it a lot, because it is costing him more than he expected, but that is very good. It’s a difficult, critical bike, which I can’t get all the juice out of now, but when you do, it’s a good bike. We have to make it not so difficult to get all the potential it has, “he added.
The general impression is that the tires do not last the race distance and that managing them will be key to being able to reach the end with options.
“Everything will depend on the rhythm. If it’s fast it’s more stressful for the tires and the physique. If it is slower, it can be managed better, it will be interesting. Quartararo is the one with the best pace, also Bagnaia. Then we are there Miller , Martín , Pol , Zarco and I include myself in that group. It depends on how the race is, we will see how the end is managed”.
An ending in which no one doubts, after the first 20 laps of the last race in Austria, Marc will be fighting for the victory.
(Before reading on, click on the image to see all the photos of Marc Márquez at the 2021 MotoGP British GP)
“Everything will depend on how I feel in the race. Top five would be a good result. The podium would be great and thinking about victory is not realistic. All the stars would have to come together. We are going to start to finish in the top five and once there try to be on the podium”, he predicted.
“We are driving well and I think we can have a good race. The objective was to have a regular level, first to be among the top five and then we will try to be among the top three. We have to go up the steps little by little because it’s no use having good feelings and being fifth today if we don’t finish it off tomorrow in the race”, settled the man from Cervera.
