Despite a woeful beginning to 2023 for Honda, LCR’s Alex Rins gave the Japanese marque some much-needed hope after claiming its first win since the 2021 Emilia Romagna GP last weekend in Texas.
Rins is a Circuit of the Americas specialist and capitalised on yet another critical error for Ducati’s Francesco Bagnaia.
But that doesn’t detract from the fact that his ending of Honda’s victory drought was a special ride from someone whose potential is often overlooked.
Bagnaia’s second successive grand prix crash has raised more questions about his ability to learn from mistakes, though he believes the bike is fully to blame for his spill.
At Yamaha, Fabio Quartararo capped off the weekend with a first podium of 2023 but feels the Japanese manufacturer needs to seriously consider radical changes to its bike.
At COTA, there were track problems, resilient performances through illness and a genuinely positive change in the mentality of MotoGP’s promoter Dorna Sports.
Here are the 10 things we learned from the 2023 MotoGP Americas Grand Prix.
It’s ironic that without Suzuki’s demise in MotoGP, Honda’s victory drought would have continued at the Americas Grand Prix.
Rins’ options for 2023 were limited, but a factory Honda deal to join LCR for two years showed HRC placed some value on his signature – even if at the beginning of the COTA weekend he was feeling somewhat like a spare part.
“I feel that Honda relies little on me; I feel untapped,” he said on Friday. “A small example is what happened in Argentina. After testing Marc's chassis, which is different from the one Joan had been using, I asked them if they would also let me test Mir's, to get an overall idea.
“I thought it was the right time to test. And they said no, even though they have spare units. I tried to talk to them, but they are very square. It's not that they don't listen to me, but that they don't take advantage of me.”
As it happened, Rins was the only competitive Honda rider in Americas. Second in qualifying, second in the sprint and a grand prix win measured against Joan Mir being the next-highest on the grid in 13th and in the sprint in 12th, while no other Honda rider finished the grand prix apart from Rins.
Rins spoke of how the Honda needs more rear grip during the COTA weekend, as it really struggles under acceleration, but that he was making steady improvements in his adaptation to the RC213V.
While the traction problems blighted the rest of the Honda riders at a circuit where low-gear acceleration is common, Rins was riding around the problem. By all accounts, this is down to the smooth riding style he has brought with him from Suzuki.
While it was thought Mir had a more-suited style for the Honda, it was Rins’ smoother cornering style that helped to mask the Honda’s traction issues as he rolled through turns more and could carry a bit of speed out of the turns on the edge of the tyre before twisting the loud lever.
Perhaps now Honda will put more emphasis on Rins’ development inputs.
Rins was strong throughout the COTA weekend, but was likely going to struggle to overhaul Francesco Bagnaia in the grand prix. The poleman and dominant sprint winner was hounded hard by Rins in the early stages of the main race, but the latter was having to “risk a bit” to stay with the Ducati.
Everything looked like it was heading the way of a grand slam weekend for Bagnaia. And then, on lap eight of 20 on Sunday, he crashed out going through Turn 2.
Marking his second grand prix crash in as many rounds, Bagnaia has surrendered 45 points and concedes he is lucky that most of his main rivals have struggled so far in 2023 – but “this luck will end”.
Ducati boss Davide Tardozzi’s Platoon-esque dropping to his knees in despair at the sight of Bagnaia’s crash said a lot about where the Italian marque thinks Bagnaia’s head is at, following his spate of errors in 2022.
Intriguingly, Bagnaia says the crash was “100% not my fault” and blamed his bike for being too stable, which means he doesn’t have any feeling front end to anticipate when it is about to fold.
“Maybe it has too much of a filter because it’s so stable,” Bagnaia explained. “Like I said, you feel that you can do everything because I feel unbeatable on my bike. Doing the time attack, managing the tyres, yesterday we demonstrated everything was perfect, the whole weekend was perfect.
“I’m given a lot of confidence on my bike but it’s too stable. You can call me crazy seeing that, but I would prefer to have more feedback because I would understand the crashes. I was entering more normal, not to crash, not to stress the tyres.”
Bagnaia was one of nine riders to crash out of the grand prix, with most pointing towards the change in wind conditions for the race and the low-grip nature of the track as the main cause. Bagnaia refuted all of these.
Whatever the true cause, Ducati will have to work overtime in the coming rounds to ensure Bagnaia’s confidence does not end up irreparably knocked.
Yamaha’s Americas GP weekend was no easier than the previous two rounds of the championship, as the usual M1 top speed and rear traction problems continue to hinder 2021 world champion Fabio Quartararo.
Quartararo was seventh in qualifying and crashed out of the sprint overriding his bike to hold onto sixth place, while in the grand prix he was powerless to stop VR46 Ducati rider Luca Marini from taking second away from him.
This was still a confidence-boosting result for the Frenchman in the grand prix, but he didn’t hold back during the weekend about where he feels the bike is at and what has to happen next.
“Of course, it has to change,” Quartararo said of the Yamaha. “I don’t know how, but even if I feel better today [in the sprint] in fighting but from four years I don’t feel a big improvement from the bike. I have more experience of the bike, but from the bike I don’t see massive improvements. The things we have to change are much bigger than having an exhaust or one small thing on the bike.”
The Yamaha is the only bike on the grid that runs with an inline-four cylinder engine, while the rest all have V4s. While the inline-four is smaller and allows for a more agile chassis set-up because of this, the V4 is the more powerful option.
For a number of years, Yamaha riders have fielded questions about whether it was time to change philosophy and build a V4. Quartararo stopped short of agreeing with this, as he has no experience of a V4, but admits that – even with the apparent engine improvements that were made over the winter with the help of Luca Marmorini – a radical overhaul is needed for 2024.
“This is the thing I cannot say [for certain whether Yamaha needs to adopt a V4], because I never rode a V4. I always rode the Yamaha and I don’t want to ask for something I never tried,” he added. “But in the end the others are using this. I think the plan for next year is not this one [to switch to a V4]. I don’t know yet, but we will start again from far away.”
It’s no secret that MotoGP has hit a skid in terms of popularity, which is reflected in TV viewing figures, trackside attendance and social media engagement.
Dorna Sports has tried a number of things to overturn this over the last few years, such as a failed docuseries and the introduction of sprint races which has so far met mixed views.
Many in the paddock for a long time have felt that, for all the good Dorna has done in MotoGP (and it has done a lot of good) its typically Spanish-minded ways have stifled its own growth. MotoGP is an exciting product, arguably more so than most motorsport series around it, and so it shouldn’t be as hard as it has been to strike new audiences.
In Dan Rossomondo, its new CCO, Dorna has seemingly found someone with the outside vision it needs to take MotoGP to new heights. Formerly vice president for global partnership and media in the NBA, as well as having experience in the NHL, Rossom Source: Autosport