After two years with the engines frozen by the covid pandemic at the beginning of 2020, the manufacturers involved in the MotoGP World Championship were able to put the new prototypes on the track that they have been working on for more than a year.
Honda , which is possibly the manufacturer that has most radically changed its bike, and Suzuki present completely new engines, while Ducati and Yamaha have evolved, more or less, their previous engine that already gave them excellent results last season.
In the case of KTM , which enjoyed concessions in 2020 and was able to continue working on its engine despite the restrictions, and Aprilia , which continues to enjoy those advantages to be able to touch the mechanics, which will disappear at the end of this season, the transition has been more gradual.
Honda gives with the tecla
The novelties of the Tokyo manufacturer have been, without a doubt, the ones that have received the most attention. After Marc Márquez’s injury at the beginning of the 2020 season, which kept him out of action for a year, the RC213V prototype entered into an alarming crisis of results and performance, becoming a true mechanical colt that repeatedly spat on its riders.
HRC has presented a more stable bike, with better rear grip, capable of dealing with the holy trinity of entering, passing and exiting the curve and, above all, a bike that in the five days of testing in Sepang and Mandalika has not ejected none of its pilots above the cupola.
The key to this change lies, to a large extent, in the adaptation of the new bike to the rear tires that Michelin introduced in 2020 and with which the RC213V has not been understood for the last two years. Solving that problem, the Honda can now squeeze more of its power and wins in the corners by being able to brake later thanks to the fact that it is more stable from the rear.
Pol Espargaró set the fastest time of the three days in Mandalika (1.31.060) and as remarkable as that was that Marc Márquez completed three more or less long stints in the final part of the test, managing to lap in 1.32 quite easily, especially between lap 36 and 46, in which he turned eight times in 32. Takaaki Nakagami, for his part, did a complete race simulation, rolling from lap 20 to 40 twelve times in 1.32, six of them consecutive ( 21-26).
The conclusion is that Honda has found the key and that the RC213V 2022 , despite its youth and the radical change compared to the previous one, has been born on the right foot, demonstrating, once again, the enormous potential of the Japanese manufacturer.
Alex Rins has been one of the strongest drivers of the preseason
Photo by: Suzuki
Suzuki improves its weak point
That the GSX-RR was the most balanced bike on the grid was made clear by Joan Mir in 2020, when he was proclaimed world champion based on regularity and always being there. However, the weak point of the Suzuki in the year of the double crown, was widened in 2021 when the rivals, especially Ducati and Yamaha, improved on the dry lap, turning the qualifying Saturdays into a real ordeal for Mi and Alex Rins.
From what we have seen in the preseason we can conclude that Suzuki has worked hard in its winter quarters and that the new engine, on which they have been working since the end of 2020, clearly increases the power of the motorcycle without disarming what was already working, the stability and, above all, the agility in the management of curves. In addition, the GXX-RR has gained in explosiveness, as Rins demonstrated on Sunday, managing to drop the 1.32 barrier up to five times, in addition to completing a final ten-lap session with a pace of 32 and a top speed of around 305 Km/h.
The evolution of the rear device that lowers the motorcycle in motion, in which the house of Hamamatsu accumulated so much delay in the last two years, has contributed decisively to this improvement and leads one to think that the Suzuki will return to the level of 2020, fighting for title.
Ducati, power without control (for now)
It was said that the Desmosedici GP21 was the perfect bike and that its 2022 evolution was going to improve what was already practically unbeatable. The other possibility, that of worsening what was already going well, was not contemplated but, for now, that is what is happening.
In addition to an improved engine compared to the last two years, Ducati has presented an evolution of the device that adjusts the height of the bike, already introduced last year. A system that allows the rider to lower the suspension when entering corners and automatically returns to the original height when exiting. On paper, a clear advantage that, however, Ducati must refine, as recognized by Gigi Dall’Igna himself, the brand’s chief engineer. The GP22 is still the most powerful bike, the one that sets the highest top speed, but it is not capable, at the moment, of displaying a good race pace.
Pecco Bagnaia, on Sunday, was able to close a lap in 1.31.436 (fifth fastest) with a top speed of 311.2 km/h. However, in he did a race simulation of 18 laps (35 to 52) without being able to drop even once from 1.33 (1.33.268, the fastest), although he did it with the medium tire, which perhaps was not the best choice.
Francesco Bagnaia and the 2022 Ducati still have work ahead of them to be as fearsome as in 2021
Photo by: MotoGP
This allows us to understand that at the level of race pace the GP22 is still a bit green, although all the brand’s drivers agree that the margin for improvement is enormous at the moment. Enea Bastianini, with the GP21, last year’s bike, completed a simulation of 12 laps (19-30), with eight of them in 1.32, including her best lap of the day (1.32.010). If the race had been yesterday, Gresini’s would have passed over Bagnaia.
The Ducati base is good, excellent, but at the moment it needs time and fine-tuning the bike. “We are not ready for Qatar, but when are we fully ready? The race is the race, it will be completely different, I feel as prepared as I can be at the moment”, concluded Jack Miller on Sunday after the test.
Yamaha does not tell us the truth
If we read the statements of Fabio Quartararo, the 2021 champion, and look at his statistics in the Mandalika test, the contradiction is aberrant. The Frenchman, immersed in the dialectical fight with Yamaha to renew his contract, which expires at the end of the year, uses the media to send alarmist messages, pressuring his factory to work, and also to raise his salary according to what he is a world champion.
Starting from a bike that was champion last year and won seven races, at Iwata, as usual, they didn’t want to make a revolution, just improve what was already going well. The result is that the M1 2022 is still what it was, a bike that does not have top speed compared to its competitors. That weakness, which was compensated by the tremendous agility in the tacking areas, the Yamaha 2021 being a real eel, has not been maintained in the new prototype as much as Quartararo would like. “When you start to feel that the front is moving everywhere, that the rear is sliding to the limit, that it is all shaking everywhere, it is difficult to find more,” the Frenchman lamented on Sunday. At Yamaha they ask for calm, they understand the concerns of their young star but they remember that the bike is new and that it must be finished coupling.
However, if we go to the analysis of the times, it is difficult not to find contradictions between what Fabio says and reality. The Frenchman, who had the second fastest time of the test (1.31.074) and was not first by 14 thousandths, set a session of 18 laps (29-46) with seven laps in 1.32 and eight in 1.33 under, including three of they 33.0. Of those 18 laps, in 16 he reached or exceeded 300 km/h.
With this pace, Quartararo would have won the race yesterday, and with a considerable advantage over, for example, the Ducati 2022. Is the Yamaha that bad? Of course not. Fabio was able to set the second fastest lap and exhibit the best pace.
Fabio Quartararo’s statements indicate one thing, but the results on track, quite another
Photo by: Yamaha
KTM, with a constant rhythm but without explosiveness
Since losing the concessions at the end of 2020, KTM has slightly slowed down its improvement curve, which until then was absolutely vertical. With fewer tests to test parts and without being able to touch the engine, the Austrians have worked on making a more stable bike, one that is capable of handling the Michelin well and offers a good pace to be competitive during the races. But that point of one-lap explosiveness has clearly been lost. No rider of the brand has managed to set a really fast dry lap, only Brad Binder came close last minute on Sunday, in his last start, with new soft rubber, the bike prepared for qualifying and an empty tank, managing to get off the 1.32 before going to the box.
The problem is that KTM’s good pace is due to consistency, something that it lacked last year, but it is not a step to overtake in the race, so they need to start from the front on the grid if they want to be in the fight. Miguel Oliveira simulated the race (20 laps, 24-43), with four high 1.32s and fifteen 1.33s, some of them low. That, for example, would have given him to beat Bagnaia in a hypothetical race, but with the handicap that the Ducati rider would have started fifth on the grid and the Portuguese 11th, which would have made things difficult for him to overtake him. KTM continues to mature its project and needs to improve in classification to be in the battle.
Aprilia, last year in paradise
Dorna marked 2022 as the last year of the concession system, to which Aprilia is still entitled, some advantages, especially when it comes to evolving the engine, which it will lose at the end of the season regardless of its results.
This means that his last year in the paradise of the open bar for tests and engines, for which the Noale house has made an enormous effort at all levels to get it right, both with the new RS-GP, and with the signing of a rider of the level of Maverick Viñales, a man who has proven to be capable of winning races with some regularity, something that the leader of the project, Aleix Espargaró, has never achieved until now.
Maverick Viñales is Aprilia’s big bet to make the final leap
Photo by: MotoGP
The 2022 Aprilia presents improvements in all aspects and mounts the same system as Ducati regarding the device that lowers the bike on exits and while moving, managing to clone the device that lowers automatically when exiting corners. It is also a bike with a good top speed, Aleix set 308.5 km/h on Sunday (v.7) lowering the clock to 1.31.385, the third fastest time of the day. Aleix did not do any race drills, but he did one session of six laps and another of seven. In the first he turned in 33 lows and a 32, while in the second he went under the barrier of 1.33 three times.
Maverick did do a mock race, completing 20 laps (46-65) without ever dropping to 32, with fifteen laps in 1.33, and a 1.33.109 as the best lap of that run. So it would have been far from fighting for the podium. In a dry lap, Viñales stopped the clock in 1.31.478, the seventh fastest, with a top speed of 309.4 km/h.
21 pilots in 1 second
The quick summary of the Mandalika test is that in the combined classification of the three days there are 21 drivers in 1 second, which would have been 22 had Raúl Fernández not been injured, and therefore things seem to be extraordinarily even.
This is so, but without losing sight of the fact that Honda got it right the first time and that it has the best rider, that Yamaha is still a rocket and has the champion, that at Ducati they will need a few races to round off GP22, and that the year past they already suffered the first half of the course to end up sweeping… but late, and that Suzuki is once again a motorcycle capable of fighting for everything to turn the 2022 MotoGP season, year 1 after Valentino Rossi, into an exciting championship.
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