Yesterday, Fabio Quartararo had the opportunity to test a prototype of the 2024 Yamaha that he will use in MotoGP. The initial feedback isn’t very reassuring…
The day after the San Marino GP, the MotoGP riders stayed on the Misano circuit. All of them had the chance to test new features that might be added to their machines for 2024. It was a crucial day for Fabio Quartararo, whose bike has been severely lacking in performance since last season. Yamaha therefore focused on testing its new engine, the main weak point of the bike for the rider from Nice. And the initial feedback provided by him was not very optimistic. “The feeling is different but I was expecting more power. It’s a bit hard to say something really positive about the engine,” explained the Maralpin at the end of the session to our colleagues at Motorsport.
On his side, team manager Mario Meregalli was more measured: “[The engineers] were expecting a difference in top speed compared to the old engine and it was better in what we saw. It was a positive day, nothing extreme but we progressed step by step and the results matched the expectations.”
Fabio Quartararo: “Progress before the Valencia test”
Despite the apparent disappointment in his words, Fabio Quartararo can take solace in having achieved the 6th fastest time in the tests, 0.5 seconds off Luca Marini’s best time. “I did a 1’31”4 with a tire that had nearly 20 laps, and that’s my qualifying time. The others are much faster than us, but they have a smaller [performance] gap than we do between low and high grip. We gain almost a second, seven or eight tenths, and for them it’s not as much.”
Another positive point is the addition of a new aerodynamic appendage called “the spoon.” This new piece has apparently been satisfactory. To the point of possibly being used as early as the next race weekend in India on September 22. Nevertheless, there is still a lot of work to be done before hoping to return to the front in competition. “The feelings are that I expected a lot more from this test, but we must stay positive and try to analyze what happened to progress before the Valencia test.” A test that is scheduled for the end of the year, around the last week of November. A moment that promises to be crucial for the future of the rider from Nice at Yamaha beyond the 2024 season.
