Joan Mir admitted that he was «angry» with Honda after Tuesday’s MotoGP test in Barcelona, as the Japanese manufacturer failed to bring any new upgrades to the beleaguered RC213V.With Honda ending the season at the bottom of the manufacturers’ championship and 49 points behind its nearest rival Yamaha, expectations were high from HRC during the all-important end-of-season test in Spain.But while …Keep reading
Source link
Gresini Ducati rider Alex Marquez says he was “surprised” at the media comments made by Honda’s Joan Mir immediately after the most recent MotoGP round in Japan.
The 2020 MotoGP champion spoke out against Marquez after being taken out of the race by the Ducati, which literally attached itself to the back of his machine after Marquez lost control on the first lap.
Mir made his comments about the “crazy” incident a short while before news of a long lap penalty for Marquez – which the Spanish rider must serve in this weekend’s Australian Grand Prix – was announced.
At the time, Mir was also under the impression that the clash was not being investigated at all. This led him to direct considerable criticism at the stewards as well as Marquez, who did accept responsibility for the crash and later said he had apologised to Mir.
“I was surprised by Mir’s reaction,” said Marquez in Australia on Thursday. “Because what he said to me didn’t make sense to me at all [compared to] what I found in the press yesterday.
“When Joan spoke in the press, he got heated and didn’t make a lot of sense. He was pissed off with race direction about the long lap [penalty that had not yet been announced].
“I was told that the reason was that I had ruined someone else’s race. But Jack Miller caused the crash at Mandalika [when the Australian took out three riders on the opening lap, and was not penalised].»
Alex Marquez, Gresini Racing
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
Marquez is 12th in the points standings heading into this weekend, having secured just one podium so far this season – a third position at the German Grand Prix.
Mir is 20th, having only occasionally troubled the scorers in a very tough year for all the Honda riders. The Spaniard’s lack of speed has been compounded by unfortunate incidents.
“It’s not just a case of bad luck. It’s also being in the wrong place at the wrong time. These kinds of things always happen when you’re fighting at the back,» said Mir.
He was, however, in more optimistic mood coming into the weekend, which will play out on a resurfaced Phillip Island circuit.
“I expect that this will help us,” Mir said. “This track is always special. It’s one I enjoy and where I have been fast in the past.
“Phillip Island is a bit different. Maybe it’s a track where we can show our progress…or maybe not!”
Joan Mir feels Honda’s double points finish in the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix was “real” and representative of where it should be in MotoGP at the moment.
Despite tangling with Trackhouse’s Raul Fernandez on the opening lap and dropping to last place, Mir was able to mount an impressive fightback to take 11th at the chequered flag and equal Honda’s best result of 2024.
The Spaniard’s run was complemented by his HRC team-mate Luca Marini finishing 12th, while Johann Zarco also finished inside the points on his LCR-run RC213V.
Mir said what Honda achieved on MotoGP’s second visit to Misano wasn’t a fluke, especially since both he and Marini missed the opening race at the Italian venue due to illness.
“In the race I was better, I had a good pace,” he explained. “The difference between Saturday and Sunday is that we improved the vibrations a little bit. That was the big change.
“I’m happy because it was a real result, it’s not the typical 12th place because it rained and a lot of people came in to change bikes.
“At the beginning of the season, as a real result, I could have finished 12th [Portugal and Jerez] or 13th [Qatar], but 11th place this Sunday is a real result and we have to be happy.
“I overtook a lot of guys with a better package than our one.
“It is also true that some riders crashed in front. Just a couple of crashes in front as usual, but not a lot.
“I’m happy, I see some improvement on the bike during this weekend.”
Joan Mir, Repsol Honda Team
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
However, Mir doesn’t want to get his hopes up after Misano, as he isn’t convinced that Honda has made a breakthrough in MotoGP yet.
“Till we don’t show it on track, I will not see any light [at the end of the tunnel],” he said.
“A lot of times I thought that they would bring something to move on from this situation and then when they didn’t bring it I was very disappointed. I don’t want to be disappointed again.
“I just stay, I give my 100%, I do my job and I go home.”
Explaining what was still lacking on the RC213V that has made Honda the worst-performing manufacturer in MotoGP, he added: “We have a lack of acceleration compared to the others and a lack of grip.
“It’s a bit of our character at the moment. But they have to be happy with it.
“In the last race I finished one minute behind [actually 50s] and it looked like it was super difficult.
“And in this race I finished 30s from the first one. That is [still] a lot but we made 27 laps. And in the first laps I lost six seconds.
“So it means that it is almost not one second per lap [of time loss]. That is actually not bad.”
Additional reporting by Gerald Dirnbeck and German Garcia Casanova
Honda rider Joan Mir feels he ‘cannot be competitive in any area’ with the RC213V in MotoGP as his miserable run in 2024 continues.
Mir was initially upbeat about a new engine configuration that Honda debuted at the start of the Austrian Grand Prix weekend but was left to accept the sad «reality» at the Japanese manufacturer come Sunday.
In a dry race where all riders were on the same tyres, the 2020 champion finished a distant 17th on the best of the factory Honda bikes, almost four seconds slower than Tech3’s Augusto Fernandez in the final points-paying position.
While the result itself was a major disappointment, the Spaniard was particularly dejected as he struggled in every department compared to his immediate rivals, losing time under braking, acceleration and also due to tyre wear.
The 26-year-old suggested that he is helpless with the way things are at Honda, as he cannot push himself to the maximum due to the limitations he is facing on its bike.
«[It is] difficult to have worse feelings than what I had. I cannot see any positive areas,» he said. «We have a lot of vibrations. It’s getting more and more and on tracks like this one, [it has] probably has been the worst one.
«I cannot see a specific area where I can be competitive. That’s the reality. It was a challenge to stay on the bike.
Joan Mir, Repsol Honda Team
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
«On braking in straights, I was locking the bike, I was locking the front a lot. That was limiting me from braking later.
«But then just before opening the throttle, my bike was spinning and then you open the throttle and just ‘float’ — you have a constant floating feeling like you cannot control [the bike].
«Then the drop of the tyre is bigger than the others and you overheat the tyres more than the others, so you cannot control [the bike].
«Also, [at] the beginning of the race I was going with the group, I had to slow down because my front [tyre] pressure was to the moon — not really able to push, that’s the reality.»
Honda was one of the three manufacturers along with Yamaha and KTM to complete two private days of running at Misano this week, with Mir allowed to put in some laps behind the RC213V due to the concessions the Tokyo-based manufacturer has received under the regulations.
The test precedes a run of five MotoGP rounds in six weekends between late August and early October, which also includes a Dorna-organised track day between the two Misano weekends.
Mir stressed that the extra track time will be important for Honda in trying out new updates and designing the next version of the bike for 2025.
«We have now quite a busy schedule, we have to try, we have to test in Misano on Wednesday, one day then in Aragon, we will try more things, then Misano race and Misano [official] test again,» he said.
«We will try more things, different engine configurations. We will try something to help on the grip and some big things that can help us to understand what the direction is for next year to let them [Honda] work and let them have a bit more time to bring one thing that works.»
Apart from Mir, Honda has also been tapping into the experience of LCR recruit Johann Zarco, who spent the last four seasons riding Ducati machinery, to come out of the doldrums in MotoGP.
Asked what approach Honda should take in the coming months, Zarco said it’s imperative for the fallen Japanese giant to have a strong baseline for the RC213V before it starts throwing new parts on the bike.
«Ducati has been trying a lot of things in the past but now for three years everything works,» he said. «It seems like they bring parts but they have a base that works so well.
«So when you have a base you can bring everything [and] everything is working. The weak point of the Honda now is the base and as soon as we don’t create a real base, you can try everything on the wrong base and it will be wrong.
«They are trying a lot of things, maybe less visible than what Ducati or KTM are doing, the European brands are doing, but they are never stopping. When you see from close it’s quite impressive all the work which is done.»
Additional reporting by German Garcia Casanova and Lorenza D’Adderio
Honda has introduced a new engine configuration for this weekend’s Austrian Grand Prix, but the riders have warned that it won’t bring an immediate step in performance.
The Japanese manufacturer has been hard at work to dig itself out of its lowest-ever phase in MotoGP, with a number of updates planned in the coming races in Europe.
The first significant upgrade is a new engine specification that LCR’s Takaaki Nakagami and HRC duo Luca Marini and Joan Mir are trialling at Spielberg, possibly with some variations between them.
Johann Zarco, who has previously gone for a different approach with a motor that is more powerful but harder to ride, will remain on the same bike that he raced with at Silverstone to gather more data.
From the outside, the new package is a welcome boost for HRC as it has been much slower in bringing in new components than Yamaha, another manufacturer that has been given extensive freedom to develop the bike in the middle of the season as part of MotoGP’s new concession system.
But Marini doesn’t think there is much speed to gain from the improved engine, even as he praised HRC for bringing in updates to the track for the second half of the campaign.
“’New engine’ is a big, big word, I will say [it is] a little upgrade,” he said.
“Because in terms of performance we saw after the Silverstone race, Taka’s performance [with a different spec] looks a little bit better but still not the same as the other engines [and] is a little bit more difficult to ride.
“We are getting closer to the other engine, but still not enough.
Luca Marini, Repsol Honda Team
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
“But I will say good job that they made this upgrade. It’s part of the process. It is important to keep pushing, keep working, even small upgrades are something good. I’m just happy for this.
“We will see but it will not change our performance on track.”
Marini’s team-mate Mir was more optimistic about the ultimate potential of the upgraded engine, but also suggested that it wouldn’t immediately transform Honda’s fortunes in MotoGP.
“This weekend we have a different engine configuration, this is something great,” he said. “It’s a quite neat, fresh configuration.
‘It will not be a configuration that you put on track and straight away it is fast.
“So it’s something that will [require] some time to understand, some time to put the electronics side correctly, maybe the set-up.
“It will be a bit of work behind but it’s nice to have some new big things to try to understand if it’s the [right] direction or not, if it’s better, with more top speed or not, we have to see.”
Joan Mir, Repsol Honda Team
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
Honda’s stable of four riders have opted for different engine configurations in the past, with there being some disagreement over what the best way forward is for the marque.
Mir hopes that the engine upgrade a number of Honda riders will be running on their RC213Vs this weekend will give a definitive answer as to what direction to take going forward.
“It’s not an engine that I didn’t try before, it’s a configuration I didn’t try before. The engine is not new, it’s the configuration,” he clarified.
“It makes sense after all the struggle we have been through, especially at the beginning of the season.
“We realised the direction in that area was not the right one and we came back so it’s a little bit the direction we wanted to do when we came back. Those two steps that we want to do.
“We don’t expect two steps. it’s just to understand if it’s the direction we have to continue, that we will use.”
Additional reporting by Lorenza D’Adderio and Gerald Dirnbeck
Joan Mir will stay with Honda’s factory team until the 2026 MotoGP season after signing a new two-year deal, HRC has announced.
Despite two miserable seasons on the RC213V that prompted Mir to consider an early retirement, the Spaniard has been clear for some time that he would like to extend his tenure with Honda.
Last month, Motorsport.com revealed that Mir and Honda have verbally agreed terms of their new contract, with only some formalities to be completed before the deal is signed.
With the signature now received, Honda finally announced on Friday that Mir would continue to lead its MotoGP programme until the end of the current rules cycle.
The 2020 champion is currently Honda’s top runner in the riders’ standings in 18th place, having scored 13 points to 12 of LCR recruit Johann Zarco.
«First of all, I am very happy to be able to compete with Honda and HRC for the next two years,” said the Spaniard.
It was my goal to continue this partnership, and this time I have been able to achieve it. HRC and I have been in partnership since 2023, and as we continue to do so, I believe that by continuing to input my opinions to HRC, I can contribute to improving the RC213V.
“I know what I need to do and I know what Honda can achieve, so I hope that we can both achieve it. We will continue to work hard for the future for the remainder of this season.»
Joan Mir, Repsol Honda Team
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
Honda is going through a nightmare campaign in MotoGP, with none of its four riders breaking inside the top 10 in a race in the opening half of the season.
The Japanese manufacturer sits dead last in the championship table heading into next weekend’s British Grand Prix at Silverstone after scoring half as many points as its nearest rival Yamaha.
However, HRC is pleased with the role Mir has played in the development of the RC213V and the Spaniard is now seen as a key player inside the factory after the departure of six-time champion Marc Marquez.
The news of Mir’s contract extension means Honda will head into 2025 with an unchanged line-up, with team-mate Luca Marini already having a deal for next season.
Mir and Marini will be supported by test riders Stefan Bradl and Aleix Espargaro, the latter joining from Aprilia next year after retiring from active competition.
«I am very happy to be able to compete in MotoGP with Joan Mir for two years from 2025,” said HRC president Koji Watanabe.
“This has been a tough season for Honda and HRC, unlike anything they have ever experienced before. Even in these circumstances, Mir has trusted the team, and we are very grateful for his attitude of never giving up and fighting at any time.
“We, along with Mir, would like to work together with all the stakeholders to make a comeback and do our best to meet the expectations of our fans as soon as possible. Once again, thank you to all the fans who always support us. We look forward to your continued support.»
Reports by Motorsport.com saying Joan Mir is set to stay with Honda in MotoGP for two more years came as some surprise given the misery of the past two seasons.
To say the last three years for Mir have been brutal would be something of an understatement.
The 2020 world champion was nearing renewing with Suzuki, with whom he won the title, early in 2022 when the Japanese brand made its shock decision to quit the series at the end of that year.
It forced him into signing for the factory Honda squad for the 2023/24 seasons, stepping right into the fire as the competitiveness of the RC213V hit its nadir after an already tricky couple of years following Marc Marquez’s final title win in 2019.
Numerous injury woes forced Mir out of five grands prix last season and he ended the campaign with a meek tally of 26 points.
This marked the worst points tally for a full-time Repsol Honda rider ever in the modern MotoGP era. Previously that dishonour belonged to three-time MotoGP champion Jorge Lorenzo, who managed just 28 points in his sole year with the team in 2019 before retiring (Stefan Bradl’s 27-point haul in 2020 is not being considered for this stat, as he was drafted in to replace Marc Marquez after breaking his arm in round one).
Things have not improved at all in 2024, despite concession regulations brought in to help the struggling Japanese manufacturers.
Mir is currently 18th in the standings on just 13 points, achieving a best GP result of 12th. He is the top Honda rider in the championship, four points clear of LCR’s Johann Zarco whose best result is also 12th. Team-mate Takaaki Nakagami is a point behind, while Mir’s team-mate Luca Marini is yet to score after seven rounds.
Joan Mir, Repsol Honda Team
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
Mir has crashed seven times this season already (having done so 24 times across 2023), while Honda has spent much of the year chasing its tail as the engine characteristic it found in pre-season testing led to “unexpected” problems. Thus, not much development has actually been done to address the bike’s poor grip and handling.
Prior to the rider market bursting into life at the Italian GP, the signs were that Mir was facing retirement rather than carrying on. That’s changed.
“The priority has been that one [to stay with Honda] for one year ago or something, because it’s true that I’ve been unlucky to be part of probably the worst moment of Honda in history,” Mir said on Thursday at the Dutch GP.
“Also, I still have the feeling that if I leave I will be failing in this project because when another rider in the past left this project, he was with some good results in the past and it’s not my case. I don’t have good results with this team and I will have a different feeling if I leave. So, the priority at the moment is that one. Of course, the decision is not done because we have different options to do. But the priority is that one.”
Mir spoke last year that during his lay-off with injury following a crash at the Italian GP that he considered retiring, but that fear of failure kept him motivated for the challenge ahead. When Marc Marquez announced he’d be leaving, Mir stepped up to sound himself out as the leader HRC should be throwing its weight behind.
Though the results have been lacking, his stablemates have expressed on numerous occasions in 2024 that Mir has been the only Honda rider to be able to improve the pace threshold of the bike from Friday through Sunday.
So, losing him would be a big blows for Honda. The same can’t be said for the other way around, though, with a rider of Mir’s calibre deserving of much better than what Honda has currently delivered.
Joan Mir, Repsol Honda Team
Photo by: Repsol Media
But he is convinced by what Honda has been working on and the direction it is going.
“I think what is coming is going to be better,” he noted. “I don’t know if it will be the step to be with those guys [our rivals], because every time we improve the others improve. We never reach that potential. But it’s true we will get closer, I’m sure about this.
“And the direction they want to take is very interesting. This season we’ve been a bit unlucky because with one engine character that looks like it was pretty good in Sepang test then started giving us some unexpected problems. We had to come back, the engineers had to work on that and not on developing. We lost a bit of time there.”
Mir didn’t comment on what direction Honda is going on that has brought him enthusiasm and it won’t be lost on him that Yamaha – who has brought a new engine for the Dutch GP – has been developing and testing at a faster rate than HRC.
There is also the element to consider that Mir’s options outside of Honda are limited, certainly when it comes to the financial package Honda can offer compared to the few remaining teams left without firm line-ups.
Mir is taking something of a leap of faith, as the next big upgrade isn’t expected until September, though he told Spanish media at Assen that it is a risk to hold off because he could find himself without a seat.
In some ways, then, Mir’s back was against the wall. But given how bad his stint at Honda has been, a decision to retire would have been more understandable than a two-year commitment to the Japanese marque.
Joan Mir will continue to ride for the factory Honda team until the end of the 2026 season after agreeing a contract renewal with the Japanese marque, Motorsport.com has learned.
The development also means that the 2017 Moto3 and 2020 MotoGP champion will remain in the premier class for another two years, taking his career tally to eight seasons already.
The Spaniard made his debut with Suzuki in 2019 and won the championship in only his second season, before Suzuki’s sudden exit from MotoGP prompted him to move to Honda in 2023.
Since joining the Tokyo-based manufacturer, Mir has contested a total of 22 grands prix, but is yet to score a podium or a pole position. A fifth-place finish achieved on MotoGP’s visit to India last September remains his best result on the Honda.
Although no rider has been able to make the RC213V work in recent years, Honda has valued Mir’s progress and the role he has played in the development of the beleaguered bike.
Mir is also currently Honda’s highest-placed rider in the championship standings, holding 18th place with 13 points. He has four more points on his tally than LCR’s Johann Zarco (19th) and has outscored Taakaki Nakagami (20th) by five points. Team-mate Luca Marini sits 24th having yet to open his tally in 2024.
Although a number of names have cropped up as potential options for Honda, the reality is that it had always seen Mir as its first option. As such, HRC has now come to a verbal agreement to keep him in its line-up for another two seasons, with an announcement expected soon.
The decision also offers stability at the factory team, with Marini already tied to the squad until the end of 2025. Zarco also has a contract to race a Honda with LCR next year.
Joan Mir, Repsol Honda Team
Photo by: Repsol Media
Outside of Honda trio Mir, Marini and Zarco, a number of riders have valid contracts for 2025: Marc Marquez will join Francesco Bagnaia at Ducati, Brad Binder and Pedro Acosta will race for KTM, Maverick Vinales and Enea Bastianini will team up at Tech3, Fabio Quartararo will lead Yamaha, while Jorge Martin will join Aprilia.
Retirement threat thwarted
This development has poured cold water on rumours that Mir could potentially prematurely retire from MotoGP after the 2024 season.
After a troubled start to the year and pre-season tests in which the steering of the bike had completely deviated from his instructions, Mir seriously considered hanging up the helmet at the age of 27.
However, in recent tests, Honda has rectified the course and it seems that there is finally some light at the end of the tunnel, giving Mir some hope about the development of the RC213V.
Another positive news is that Honda is still negotiating long-standing contracts about its own future, which means that a Suzuki-style farewell will not be on the cards before 2027.
The same year, new technical regulations are set to come into force in MotoGP, offering Japanese manufacturers to catch up with their European rivals.
Honda has been working behind the scenes in private tests to improve its troubled 2024 package, though its riders didn’t receive some hoped-for improvements at Barcelona last weekend.
Johann Zarco did race with a new aerodynamic package, while an updated engine was used by Mir and Luca Marini also.
But this did little to help Honda at Barcelona, with LCR’s Takaaki Nakagami the lead HRC rider in 14th ahead of Mir, Zarco and Marini – all of whom outside of 30 seconds from the race victory.
The low-grip nature of Barcelona accentuated Honda’s traction woes, with Mir noting that the updated engine configuration made this fact worse.
However, he believes it is a direction Honda needs to persevere with as the scope for improvement with it is higher than what he raced previously.
“Honestly a nightmare,” Mir said of his Catalan GP. “I had very bad feelings all weekend.
“As I said, I expected a struggle on this track. We are using a different engine configuration, and I don’t feel good with it. The spin level is probably worse than the other one, and then the top speed is much less.
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
“So, in the other races I was able to be a lot closer to the first one, to the group, and probably being able to fight with the group of the top 10.
“Here I didn’t have any option to do it. So, we probably took a step back to make two forward in the future. But at the moment it’s tough and the situation is like this – it’s even worse.”
He added: “The margin [of the updated engine] is higher. And in the short-term, it’s probably better to receive some upgrades. So, it’s the right choice.”
Marini agreed with Mir’s feedback but also noted that he was able to actually enjoy riding the bike now.
“With the new upgrade, the spin is more,” the Italian said. “It’s one of our problems, but [on] this track the spin is a problem for everybody – I think also for Pecco [Bagnaia]!
“So, we have to be focused and smart to understand in which area to work.
“In my opinion, we are doing a great job, we just need to wait for more upgrades and find more performance because at least now the bike is [at a point] where I can enjoy.
“I feel not in an incredible way but for sure much better than in the first races of the season. So, now I can ride, I can defend myself and I can attack, so this is great.
“But still, we miss performance. So, we are waiting for this. Maybe in Mugello we can have something more.”