For Fabio Quartararo, the Grand Prix MotoGP
Barcelona Solidarity will above all serve as a benchmark for next Tuesday's test…
As usualwe report here his words during his debriefing, without the slightest formatting, and today directly transcribed from French.
How are you approaching the last race of the season? What will happen?
Fabio Quartararo : “What will happen, I don’t know. In any case, we hope to have a good race, the last 2 were better, we will try to continue this momentum a little bit. Afterwards, it's certain that my eyes are more on Tuesday than on the race for the moment. »
Are you expecting a lot to do on Tuesday?
“There are a lot of things to do. We also have a new team that is getting started. We have quite a few things to try, so I really hope we get some positive results from this test. »
With the weather forecast, what do you expect in terms of grip?
“Grip level, it depends: at the front, it will take longer to heat it up, but I think that at the rear we will have even better grip, because when the temperatures are too high, we know that here it's very complicated, so the biggest difficulty will be heating the front tire. »
And the fact that you are on a circuit where the grip is not great, can that help the development of the Yamaha, and if so, in what way?
“So for this weekend it's certain that it's going to be less good, because it's a circuit which is very complicated in terms of grip for us. On the other hand, in terms of seeing if we improve on Tuesday on the grip, that's where we will really have the difference on a circuit which has a lot of grip. We know that in Misano we had very good results in the last two races, but the circuit has a lot of grip and we can't really know if we have taken a step forward. »
How would you describe this season?
“The worst in terms of results. Then, in terms of the project, I think we have grown enormously from the start of the season to now, so I can't wait to see a little bit of the project when we will arrive in Buriram, take a look at the bike we will have for next year. »
The project you could have had at the start of the season with the bike you had, and where you have arrived today, is it satisfactory?
“I think I expected things to change a little bit more quickly. On the other hand, just aesthetically, we see that the bike has completely changed from Qatar to now, and even in terms of riding, I think we have taken a very big step forward, even if in terms of results we are not I don't really see it. But in the last two races we see that I qualified 6th in Thailand, in Malaysia we finished P5 in the Sprint, P6 in the race, so it's already much better. So I think we are moving forward more and more. »
In Malaysia, your teammate still made a lot of progress on the bike. Is that something that really helped the team understand the settings a little more?
“In Malaysia he used the new engine, unfortunately we didn't use it. So I think there is still progress and I hope that on Tuesday, with this new engine, we will really be able to see a nice improvement. »
He explained that what worked was that he found the settings to make the bike smoother, and that was something you had understood quite well for a long time. Can you explain a little what it involves?
“It's about gaining a little more grip, having the most flexible bike in one sense but not for example when braking, we like to have a bike that's really stiff when braking, but flexible in several aspects. And so this is something that especially Ducati has worked very well on and something that we are trying to do for the future. »
Martin has a good chance of being champion. How much credit would you give him with everything you've seen from him this season? What puts him in this position?
“For me, it’s not just in this position, it’s the last 2 seasons he’s done, it’s incredible! We know that even if he has an official bike, being in a satellite team is always a little more complicated, because we don't really know if we have the maximum support or not. So I think he deserves it very much. He had the last 2 incredible seasons. But this season he made fewer mistakes than Pecco and I think he really deserves it. »
Would you be surprised if this weekend we see that Ducati tries to advantage Bagnaia more than Martin?
“I don’t think they will.” If they were going to do it, they would have already done it much earlier. And I think that, especially at the moment, when we have an official Ducati, we know very well that finishing outside the first 5 or 6 is still complicated. »
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