Marquez: no urge to switch back to 2015 RCV

Lost among the back and forth with Valentino Rossi was that Marc Marquez ended the day third fastest at Sepang. The reigning world champion, who was victorious last year at the Malaysian venue, was two tenths off the pace of Jorge Lorenzo and afterwards was relatively pleased with how his bike was handling and the consistency that he felt from the Honda RC213v.

“Both myself and Dani are more constant than on other tracks, but Jorge is also very consistent. But as happens every year, what’s going well in February and in October will not have to do all the set up again. We arrived here with a chassis, swingarm and various leaks and we have to see everything.”

Those changes to the bike, which saw the Spaniard revert to last year’s chassis from the Dutch TT onwards came because while Marquez could still ride to the limit he couldn’t ride as consistently close to the limit as he had in the past. This led to a string of crashes but in the second half of the year he has been much more consistent. Armed with more confidence under braking he can continue to press the strong points of the chassis, the ability to break deep and hard into corners, while also leaving him better able to deal with the negative aspects of the Honda.

When asked if he had felt any urge to switch back to the 2015 chassis Marquez said:

“No because I do not want to have to understand that bike or find the limit. In the private test at Misano we returned to try the bike and we decided we have now. I hesitated only here in Malaysia in February, but we have to continue with what we have now which is what gives us consistency throughout the year and the championship.“