Espargaró & Honda End MotoGP Pre-Season Testing On Top

Calum Gill 09:26 13/02/2022

Honda’s all-new MotoGP bike ended the final 2022 pre-season test at Indonesian venue Mandalika on top, courtesy of Pol Espargaró.

Espargaró, who had already been quickest on the opening day of the three-day test, surpassed Luca Marini’s Saturday benchmark in the first hour on Sunday, setting the 01:31.060 that now stands as the new Mandalika track’s new lap record. The Spaniard was left buoyed not only by a strong performance on the kind of low-grip track that would’ve stymied him on last year’s Honda, but also by the fact he’d had no crashes on the new-spec RC213V, dubbing it “safer than ever”. Team-mate Marc Márquez was only 14th, but had forgone anything resembling a qualifying simulation, having run out of energy in his right shoulder.

Reigning champion Fabio Quartararo, irked by the Yamaha’s lack of progress and particularly distressed by his recent struggles to extract one-lap pace, was an encouraging second-fastest. Quartararo came up just 0.014 seconds short of the top time, while Aleix Espargaró completed the top three for Aprilia, three tenths down on his brother and a tenth down on Espargaró. Yamaha rider Franco Morbidelli moved up to fourth in the closing minutes in his best pre-season showing so far. Late-2021 form man Francesco Bagnaia ended the day in fifth place, admitting to media afterwards that he’d been struggling to extract his usual single-lap pace through testing but had finally made a step forward on Sunday.

Álex Rins made it five different manufacturers in the top six for Suzuki. His team-mate Joan Mir had to sit out the day completely due to apparent gastroenterological problems. “This morning when I woke up I felt something strange in my stomach, like everything was moving,” Mir explained. “After having some breakfast I went to the track, but once I was there, in the office I started to feel much worse and I started to throw up. I had to go back to the hotel because I was completely exhausted.”

The top KTM was that of Brad Binder in ninth, the South African among those to post a late improvement. Among the KTM contingent, Raúl Fernández completed just seven laps, before crashing and calling it a day due to feeling the apparent after-effects of a big head-bruising fall the day prior. Beyond Fernández, there was crashes for three Ducati riders in Jack Miller, Johann Zarco and Jorge Martín, along with a fall for Aleix Espargaró.

MotoGP Mandalika Test Combined Standings