The new MotoGP world champion has not only been the fastest rider this season, where he is the one who has won the most races, with five to date. Fabio Quartararo has cemented his first title in a regularity that was precisely the one that cost him the crown a year before.
In the 16 grands prix it took to clinch the championship, El Diablo qualified front row in all of them, was the only rider to score points in every race, and only crashed five times.
After taking the title, at the next stop in Portimao a week ago, the boy from Nice left for the first time so far in 2021 due to a fall that he himself recognized that he was able to avoid.
This Friday, in Valencia, Quartararo did not start particularly well. Yamaha was caught by surprise in the rain in FP1 and they didn’t have time to set the wet settings.
“Our weather forecast said it wasn’t going to rain, but it did and we didn’t have time to get the [proper] settings. I started with some settings that weren’t the best, but frankly it was right in the last sector where we lost a lot of [time]. For the rest, I was eight tenths away until the third sector. It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t a disaster either. The explanation is mainly that we didn’t have time to change our set-up,” said Quartararo, who finished FP1 in 15th place. 1.5s behind the best time set by Iker Lecuona.
“The sensations were very bad. I didn’t have any feeling . That’s what I can’t understand. I’m driving like always. We’ve done 17 races: from Qatar to Portimão the feeling was the same in free practice 1 and here I’m totally lost. So which is something very strange and I’m looking forward to the time to talk to the team because there is something I don’t understand”.
“We don’t know what’s going on. We don’t know where we are, we don’t know what the feeling is up front. The bike turns quite well, but it’s very aggressive at the front and doesn’t convey any feeling. We’re a bit lost, I’m a bit lost. “The team is looking if there was something strange: in the first corner I was very careful and lost a lot of time. There are many corners where the bike behaves very strangely.”
Quartararo denies that he has relaxed after winning the title and that he does not need a vacation after a season of 18 grands prix.
“In Portimão it was something different. I think if I had to play for the title there, it wouldn’t have happened. I would have been smarter and finished fifth or sixth. It has nothing to do with [the title]. In Portimão, I was first in in FP1, first in FP2, second by a thousandth in FP3, so we were there from the beginning, except we had complications, and now we have no feeling and I think it has nothing to do with us getting the title in Misano “.
“[I don’t] say to myself ‘I can’t wait for the holidays’. It’s just frustrating to be in a grand prix and not understand what’s going on, especially that it’s the last one. I have no feeling, and that’s what matters most. It pisses me off. I don’t understand why it happens here. The same thing happened last year, it was a disaster,” he stressed.
(Click on this link or on the image to see the photos of Fabio Quartararo at the Valencia GP 2021 MotoGP)
