From his eleventh position after this first day of the Catalan Grand Prix, Pol Espargaró can say that he is the first of the Honda drivers, just ahead of the one who took Marc Marquez's RC213V in his place, Taka Nakagami. But he regrets not yet being in Q2, a milestone that he knows he absolutely must cross at the end of the cool, early morning FP3, unless he finds himself in a scrum of Q1 in the heat of the afternoon which he doesn't really believe in his chances. With all that, he must manage the post-2022 file. But he has some ideas in the form of returning to the Austrian fold…
Pol I will espargaro understood during this Friday in Catalonia that the freshness of the morning had its destiny in its hands. Conditions which soften its handicaps with the Honda and the pitfall of having to drive on a track with such poor grip that it is criticized by the drivers. However : " Even though the track is known for its low grip level, I felt worse in terms of grip on other tracks » said the younger brother of an Aleix enthroned at the top of the timesheet. “ In the afternoon, when the grip conditions were at their worst, I felt better than I expected with the medium racing tire “, said Pol Espargaró with surprise.
Alas, the illusion did not last: “ but when everyone put on the soft rear tire we came back to reality and it was 11th place ". And he drew this conclusion: “ I absolutely have to pre-qualify for Q2, otherwise it will be chaos in Q1 in the afternoon with the high temperatures “, explained the thirty-year-old about his plan for Saturday. “ We can't afford to start from the fourth or fifth row because overtaking is so difficult ».
Paradoxically, the complicated and criticized track conditions could help him: “sOn tracks where grip is poor, you can't push the bike to its limit. You have to drive very gently overall and the difference between the drivers is small. With good grip, the differences between the bikes are particularly noticeable during a timed lap, but that is not possible here ».
Pol Espargaro: “ we did not stand idly by«
There remains the other question which continues Pol I will espargaro : what about 2023? A question that has become more pressing since HRC moved the RC213V from Marc Marquez towards the LCR team for the benefit of Taka Nakagami. He responds to this subject, as he already responded the day before… “ For the moment I am quite calm. At Honda I feel comfortable and they treat me well, there is an option to continue, also in another place. To be honest, we did not sit idly by and I have other very interesting options, perhaps economically more interesting than being here at Honda ».
That being said, he does not want to close any doors, as there are not a plethora of open ones: “ at the end of the day what I want, at my age, is not to earn more money, but to be calm, happy and achieve results, and here at the moment the results are not coming and the bike is not working as we all would like. We will examine the options available to us in the coming weeks and we will decide very soon ».
KTM is a possible destination in 2023: “ there are different options, including that of KTM. Now it's just rumors and gossip, there are also other riders in my situation with the option to move, for example to KTM, or to other teams. Must wait. It's a chess game, everyone moves their pieces ". And serve again Honda in the LCR satellite team, would this be possible? As a response, he recalls this news of which he is the victim: “ Taka Nakagmi is more official at the moment than me, because he tests things that I don't have, so Lucio Cecchinello's team is also very valid, with very good and experienced mechanics. The motorcycles are the same as ours. I wouldn't worry about ending up there, it's no problem, we'll see ».
MotoGP Catalonia J1: MotoGP FP1 and FP2 results
Credit classification motogp.com
