In fact, after the French Grand Prix, the curves speak to us… not much!
Indeed, if Jorge Lorenzo's is quite homogeneous, with a classic progressive loss of time of just half a second over the laps (which can also be attributed to his comfortable lead), those of Valentino Rossi and Maverick Vinales are too “marked” by the successive overtakes they had to make.
So we compared Lorenzo's curves during the last two events which, apart from the tires and electronics, presented similar characteristics; start on the front row for Lorenzo, third for Rossi, and higher temperatures in the race than in practice.
The main difference that stands out is that Lorenzo could attack very hard with the Bridgestones during the first 4 laps, which he could not do with the Michelins.
For the rest, the performances are similar until a little after halfway, then the Mallorcan driver slows down very gradually, which is probably linked to his comfortable lead.
Concerning Rossi, the first 4 laps are exactly the same... but half a second slower in 2016. This continues until the 10th lap where the Yamaha rider (and his tires) finds the same pace as in 2015.
Marquez's overtaking on the 13th lap cost him time, then the #46 eased up a lot after the 16th lap, when Marquez and Dovizioso made a mistake.
In summary, the Michelin tires meant a slightly slower start to the race than in 2015 before returning to similar performances.
The configuration of the 2016 event does not allow us to say whether, subsequently, the drop in times is linked to tire wear or to a voluntary drop in pace, Lorenzo, Rossi and Vinales being separated by several seconds not forcing them to ask the maximum from their tires.
