Yamaha had another complicated season in 2024, even the year ended better than it started. Things are obviously never easy, when a factory which only has two riders, tries to fight against those which have four, or even eight, as far as Ducati was concerned.
Before the summer, however, Yamaha worked a lot on this point to approach 2025 with better assets. This is how Pramac Racing signed with Iwata during the Assen Grand Prix. However, the benefits of this collaboration have not yet been observed. For now, Yamaha's men are continuing their efforts to get closer to others with less data, as assured by the brand's sporting director.
“It was the longest season of all, but I'm happy with the effort everyone put in, confides Massimo Meregalli on MotoGP.com. We never gave up. After Aragon we started to see better results. The sign that everything we had done so far was working. Because if you work hard, but you don't see any results, it's harder to take.
As I said, from Aragon we start to see the light at the end of the tunnel, he continues. And we maintain this pace because the aerodynamicists work hard and well. The pilots also started to understand how the aero works, when we went back. Let's say that when we went back to old specifications, they understood the benefits of the new one. »
© Yamaha MotoGP
Quartararo alone on board
Especially since in terms of its riders, Yamaha was not able to count on Alex Rins at 100% of his abilities. His French teammate therefore had to pull the team along for most of the season. Efforts which did not fail to impress at Yamaha.
“Fabio is one of the guys who put a lot of effort into it, adds the Italian again. He tries to adapt and change his riding to ride the bike. It's not easy. Alex Rins, he didn't arrive 100%, he had ups and downs, then another accident at Assen. He broke his wrist. For me, he was never in the conditions where he could push and give 100%. Even when overdriving. »
Despite everything, the Spaniard's understanding of motorcycling improved at the end of the season, like the few top-10s, still rare, that he scored in the second half of the season.
“He’s starting to get closer. For us it is very important. First of all, we know what he's capable of. But being all alone and fighting with all the other manufacturers, who have more bikes, is a big disadvantage. So when Alex is in good shape, we have at least two drivers to evaluate the data. »
From now on, the debut of Miguel Oliveira and Jack Miller with Pramac Yamaha is long overdue. “For me it will be a big step when we have four drivers. This will give us significant profits. »
The beginnings of this collaboration could result in big news. It is rumored that Yamaha is preparing to test its V4 on track, during the Shakedown organized at Sepang.
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