Quartararo: "In Japanese factories sometimes we take too much care of the rules"

August 18, 2022

The leader of the MotoGP World Championship, Frenchman Fabio Quartararo, celebrated this Thursday at the press conference prior to the Austrian Grand Prix, that Yamaha had decided to introduce changes in the usually closed Japanese mentality.

“I think that at Yamaha there is a parallelism (with Honda), we are quite far away and taking too much care of certain rules, sometimes you have to play a little more and not follow the rules so much,” he said when they told him that Marc Márquez had asked Honda for a change in the way of working.

“For next year things are changing, a new engineer is joining, they are adopting a bit of the European mentality and although it is going slowly, I think we are on the right track. Sometimes you have to try anything, even if it seems useless, You have to try everything,” he stressed.

Focusing on the Austrian weekend, the big news is the new chicane that the circuit presents between turns 1 and 3.

“For our bike I don’t think it will be negative to reduce the speed of the rest of the bikes a bit, you don’t lose the front end when entering the chicane from the right, it will be better for safety and in terms of performance of our motorcycle,” he explained.

On a personal level, the Frenchman continues to lead the championship solidly, however he has lost many points (42) compared to Pecco Bagnaia in the last two races, something that could be aggravated on a clearly better track for the Ducati.

“I felt pretty good here, especially in the second race last year, we finished 7th but until the rain came we were fighting for victory, we have the speed, pace-wise it’s not bad for us, we have more work to do in overtaking, I think that with the chicane this circuit will be a little better for us”, he deepened.

Looking at the performance of the rest of the Yamaha riders, it would seem that Fabio is at the limit of what the M1 can give.

“I am pushing Yamaha to the limit to bring us something, but there is nothing more. As a rider I am learning a lot and I think I have improved, I have taken a step forward and I hope to continue taking more steps forward until the end of the season.”

Now that Bagnaia looms as a fearsome opponent, Fabio was asked to compare his duels with the Italian to those he had with Marquez in the past.

“They are two tough rivals, with Marc I have not been able to win, I had two fights with him in Misano and Thailand, but when you go after him you learn a lot. With Pecco we have not had a proper fight, but he is a very tough rival for him championship, here we are the best riders in the world”, he recalled.

We must not forget, either, that his most direct rival for the championship right now is still Aleix Espargaró, second overall with 22 points, an Aleix with whom he has a great relationship that has not changed after the touch they had in Assen.

“I think there is no way I can change the relationship, outside the circuit I don’t think we are going to fight, when we compete there is a lot of respect, but we all want to win. It doesn’t change anything, the goal in everyone’s mind is victory. But our relationship outside the competition is the same, it’s not going to change,” said the boy from the Côte d’Azur.

Fabio Quartararo, Yamaha Factory Racing