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Luca Marini (8th) does not understand HRC: “Why should we waste time?”

Luca Marini finished 8th as the top Honda rider at the MotoGP spectacle at the Sachsenring. He is calling on HRC to be more daring and test new parts as early as this season.

MotoGP

13.07.2026 - 11:45

This article is an automatically generated English version. The original article was published in German.

Luca Marini vor Brad Binder
© Gold & Goose

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From major doubts to a major spectacle: why GP fans have reason to be delighted

Before the start of the season, critical voices dominated, but the World Championship rounds so far have shown that the rule changes are delivering exactly what was hoped for: excitement right up to the final lap.

Starting from 13th on the grid, Luca Marini fought his way up the field in the 30-lap race at the Sachsenring. As early as the first lap, he overtook his team-mate Joan Mir and Franco Morbidelli (Ducati). After that, the Italian was stuck behind Jack Miller (Yamaha) for a long time, unable to get past him – until the Australian’s tyres started to wear out towards the end. Thanks to several retirements ahead of him, Marini moved up to eighth place, 18.6 seconds behind the “King of the Sachsenring”, Marc Marquez. This made Marini the best-placed Honda rider. In the battle between the Japanese manufacturers, only Yamaha rider Fabio Quartararo finished ahead of him.

Honda loses out to Yamaha in the ‘Japan Cup’

For Marini, eighth place was the best he could manage: “We achieved the best that was possible at the moment. That’s the potential we’ve shown in this first half of the season. It’s difficult to do better than P8, apart from on special occasions.” After the sprint race, in which he failed to score points, they completely overhauled the bike’s set-up. “I didn’t like the set-up. So we reverted to my base set-up for the race, and that was the best compromise.”

Sunday is the most difficult session anyway. After the Moto2 race, in high temperatures and with the hard rear tyre offering less grip. At the Sachsenring, it wasn’t just the rear end that caused problems: “I had a lot of understeer and movement at the front; it wasn’t easy to turn into the corners.” On the battle with the Yamahas, Marini said that Miller had been quick at first, but then slowed down significantly from one lap to the next. “It looked as though he’d had a problem.” He’d had plenty of time to analyse the competition: “The Yamaha riders turn in very well. For us, that’s not so easy at the moment; we’re struggling with it more.” His verdict on the battle between Honda and Yamaha favours the other manufacturer. “Yamaha were slightly better than us all weekend. We’ve lost the Japan Cup. That’s a point for them.”

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