Nakagami is now the longest-serving rider on the Honda LCR team, but he is also a novice on the new Honda RC213V. In this regard, it is Alex Marquez who has the most experience, coming from an approaching 2020 model, while the Japanese had a 2019 version last year. The confrontation between the two teammates promised to be interesting and it was balanced. But with a symbolic victory from whose brother you know...
Takaaki Nakagami had to resolve to finish just behind his new teammate Alex Marquez at the end of the first day of testing in Qatar. However, he finished his work in better shape since the cadet Marquez suffered a fall which left marks on his face... Still, the Japanese realized a difference between the two generations of Honda ... " For me it's a completely different bike with a lot of new features He said. " The first impression brought some positive aspects. It's definitely a challenge. I was looking forward to the test and was curious ».
Nakagami: “the character of the engine is very different”
Nakagami continues: “ the character of the engine is very different. Top speed has improved a lot. But you have to improve the bike coming out of the corner. It is quite gentle and easy to drive, but you also need to have sufficient engine power. We need to understand how we can improve this, from an electronics perspective ».
Taka knows it: “ we need to understand the details first, but there is enough work for the future. At the moment we have made some small modifications to the engine brake. On Saturday we didn't have any new pieces to try. We focused only on returns. The last day on the MotoGP bike was November 22 in Portimão. It's not easy to get back up to speed. We have a lot of new parts for the second night of testing. We will then have a lot of work to do with chassis parts and much more » concludes the Japanese on his work in MotoGP.
MotoGP Test Qatar 1 J1: times
