[Porschefire]

Sepang Test - Day 3 Results



Towards the end of the final day, a Sprint simulation were also done by majority of the riders with the following results -

1) Fabio di Giannantonio (Ducati) 1m 58.237s (over 10 laps)*
2) Jorge Martin (Ducati) 1m 58.390s (over 10 laps)
3) Enea Bastianini (Ducati) 1m 58.437s (over 10 laps)
4) Pecco Bagnaia (Ducati) 1m 58.457s (over 10 laps)
5) Aleix Espargaro (Aprilia) 1m 58.499s (over 9 laps)
6) Maverick Vinales (Aprilia) 1m 58.545s (over 9 laps)*
7) Marc Marquez (Ducati) 1m 58.556s (over 10 laps)*
8) Brad Binder (KTM) 1m 58.639s (over 9 laps)*
9) Pedro Acosta (KTM) 1m 58.644s (over 10 laps)
10) Alex Marquez (Ducati) 1m 58.811s (over 10 laps)*
11) Luca Marini (Honda) 1m 59.083s (over 6 laps)
12) Joan Mir (Honda) 1m 59.234 (over 10 laps)
13) Alex Rins (Yamaha) 1m 59.288s (over 9 laps)*
14) Johann Zarco (Honda) 2m 0.079s (over 10 laps)

*set late in the afternoon with cooler track temperatures

- Sepang lap record smashed yet again with four riders Bagnaia, Martin, Bastianini and Alex Marquez joining the 1:56 club. While the top 3 are running GP24 spec, Alex's timing is on a GP23 and that should give him a whole load of confidence going into Qatar testing and GP, that has historically been a Gresini favourite hunting ground.

- While Bagnaia and Bastianini liked the new Ducati fairing on day two, Martin still preferred the older design. However Martin was able to make the new fairing work on the final day and has confirmed it for 2024.

- Fabio Quartararo has shown very good race pace, enough to contend for big points, however, concerns in time attack mode have him worried about his MotoGP chances again in 2024. He hasn't been able to match many of the Ducati riders at Sepang over one lap, and as a result was left admitting that the same problems exist - Electronics that are 'years' behind Ducati and lack of mechanical grip.

- Luca Marini has warned his engineers to NOT try to transform the Honda into a Ducati despite “struggling” with some of the RC213V's long-running issues, including a lack of rear grip during. Marini has provided his Ducati insights on why they excelled - Ducati use the rear tire very well and that provides riders the confidence to push hard on the braking.

- Marc Marquez has agreed with Luca Marini’s description of the Ducati and the Honda requiring opposite approaches to handle the rear tyre.

- While Aleix has managed a top 5 at the end of Sepang test, Vinales has had problems despite having good sessions overall. His problems with the new bike are down to balance on corner entry, which has resulted in him feeling like the new bike is controlling him, rather than the other way around.

- In other news - Davide Brivio, who oversaw MotoGP World Championships for Yamaha (Valentino Rossi) and Suzuki (Joan Mir), will return to the sport as Team Principal of the new Trackhouse Aprilia squad.
Brivio left to join the Alpine F1 team immediately after Mir’s 2020 title victory, but will now make a MotoGP comeback as head of Aprilia’s satellite project.

[Porschefire]

Red Bull KTM

Red Bull KTM unveils its 2024 livery, which appears unchanged from 2023. The RC16 remains the fastest official motorcycle in the FIM World Championship paddock, clocking a 366.1 kmph at the hands of Brad Binder last year.

[Porschefire]

Repsol Honda

A new era has begun for the HRC’s factory MotoGP project. Officially, still titled as the ‘Repsol Honda Team’, ‘Honda Repsol’ would more accurately describe the team’s new-look 2024 livery.

For the first time since Repsol joined forces with Honda 30 years ago, branding for the Japanese manufacturer now has pride of place on its grand prix prototype.

As rumored, Repsol has been demoted to the lower fairing (where Red Bull used to be) with HRC red, white and especially blue replacing much of the previous orange for the team’s post-Marc Marquez era. The wheels are also now black.

[Porschefire]

LCR Honda

Johann Zarco embarks on his debut campaign with Castrol LCR Honda while Takaaki Nakagami enters his seventh season with Idemitsu LCR Honda.

[Porschefire]

Aprilia Racing

RS-GPs and its riders aim for the win in 2024.

[Dhruv Shetty]

Out of all the teams, I really like how Honda have designed their bikes, has a curvy design to it and the front winglet does not look wierd. But I am still going to root for the KTM Boys and Alex Rins.

[ds.raikkonen]

It seems Videopass subscription is still at the 'unobtanium' level (at least for most people). Wonder why MotoGP commercial people haven't bothered to reduce the same for new markets like India. I had tweeted regarding this earlier but no response, perhaps Dorna's CCO Rossomondo will notice this.

Jio does a good job, but only if you're watching live, which does not happen most of the times and you end up waiting a day for the highlights!

[Porschefire]

Prima Pramac Racing

The last team presentation of 2024 is done and dusted with Prima Pramac unveiling it's stunning livery.











On the livery front, this and Castrol LCR Honda take the top spot for me with Red Bull KTM and Monster Yamaha coming absolute last with no effort made whatsoever!

What do you think?

PS: Jorge Martin FTW, para mí!

[Porschefire]

GP1: 8 Mar - 10 Mar

Qatar Airways Grand Prix of Qatar

Lusail International Circuit

2024 MotoGP season kicks off at the Lusail International Circuit in the outskirts of Doha, Qatar.
The track is a flowing layout of 5.4 kilometres, surrounded by artificial grass designed to prevent sand from the neighbouring desert from blowing onto the circuit. The main straight is over a kilometre in length and there is a good mix of medium and high-speed corners, including a couple of quick left-handers which has proved particularly popular with the riders.







Previous Winners:

Over the past two seasons, the Qatar GP has been a Gresini favourite and it will be interesting to see if it proves to be third time lucky with either of the Marquez brothers winning the GP.


2023


2022

[Manoj2268]

Eurosport India has reacquired the MotoGP broadcasting rights in India for 2024 and 2025 seasons.

Hopefully - No more call of the blue adverts when there is a full blown race going on. On the other hand, we may miss out on the Friday Practice sessions altogether - we will miss the commentary and insights.

[motor_breathing]

Originally Posted by Manoj2268

Eurosport India has reacquired the MotoGP broadcasting rights in India for 2024 and 2025 seasons.

Hopefully - No more call of the blue adverts when there is a full blown race going on. On the other hand, we may miss out on the Friday Practice sessions altogether - we will miss the commentary and insights.

Last years title decider race of Valencia, Jorge Martin goes and hit the rear of Marc Marquez and Marquez is in the air, for almost two minutes Call of blue twice and Castrol ads.. Good riddance from Jio even if paid.

[Porschefire]

Bagnaia and Ducati sign two-year MotoGP renewal

Just days before the start of the 2024 MotoGP World Championship, Ducati Corse and Francesco Bagnaia solidified their future together by announcing the signing of an agreement that binds the World Champion to the Borgo Panigale manufacturer for the 2025 and 2026 seasons as well.



With this, Pecco joins Binder with confirmed contract until 2026 and, Marini and Zarco with confirmed contracts until 2025. Barring these, none of the other riders in the paddock are confirmed beyond the end of 2024.

IMO, the contract extension comes at a perfect time for Pecco as he looks to solidify his world champion status through the next couple of seasons. Ducatis (GP24 or GP23) are THE bikes to beat and will remain so at least until next year. Although, KTM and Aprilia have improved considerably in the last 2 seasons, they still aren't consistent enough to challenge the fantastic package of the Ducatis. Honda and Yamaha will probably need few more years to be competitive again. Maybe the 2025 rider market will change that, maybe not.

One thing's for certain, exciting times ahead!

[Manoj2268]

Race week. Qatar is Ducati Central with long straights but the last 2 years have been won on a hand me down lavender Gresini motorcycle.

Lets see if this trend continues. I am expecting Marc to alteast create waves in the sprint race and Acosta in the top 7 with KTMs being the best of the rest in the feature race.

Honda - they have to first dig themselves out of the hole they created for themselves.

Go #93!

[RM Motorsports]

MotoGP will continue to live telecast on Jio.

Source - X

[Manoj2268]

With 17 minutes to go in FP1 - We have #93 topping the timesheets.