Yamaha was hoping to make a lasting impression on Monday in Barcelona. Fabio Quartararo and Alex Rins were due to make a grand debut of the V1-powered M4, developed over months with Augusto Fernandez and Andrea Dovizioso. But the weather had other plans: intermittent rain disrupted the program, spoiling what could have been the icing on the cake of the weekend.
The weekend had been excellent for Quarterly : a podium in Sprint and a place in the top five in GP, results all the more valuable as they were obtained on a track historically not very forgiving with the M1, often victim of a lack of grip.
An encouraging time from Fabio Quartararo on the Yamaha V4
On Monday, due to scattered rain, the test was cut short. Despite this, Quarterly at least left a promising time imprint: an unofficial time of 1'39″3, an encouraging time for a baptism of fire on a V4 MotoGP machine, compared to his 1'37″8 in qualifying.
But it's not over. Very soon, Augusto Fernández in wild-card will put the V4 to the test in racing at Misano this weekend. Then, from Monday, Quarterly et Kidneys will resume control for in-depth testing of the new M1, now clearly the technical priority of Yamaha for the future.
This failed test therefore does not affect the ambition of Yamaha : the future in MotoGP is clearly in the hands of the V4, even if the weather sometimes decides otherwise. By the way, fabio quartararo is the second driver to have taken the most pole positions this season, behind Marc Marquez. Il has clearly become Yamaha's Marc Marquez, and there is only one thing missing: operate the new V4 engineWe will see if Yamaha can offer Quartararo a competitive bike in 2026. That's all he needs to get back into the MotoGP World Championship race.
