Photo credits: Yamaha Racing
The French Grand Prix (French GP) has closed its veil and Marc Marquez of Repsol Honda has clinched the title this round. The Spaniard took on his second consecutive win after championing his hometown race in Spain two weeks ago. However, Monster Energy Yamaha has had a lot to talk about after their run on the Le Mans track. Valentino Rossi has managed to secure fifth place in the French GP despite coming close to bag second place. Teammate Maverick Viñales, on the other hand, suffered a premature ending due to a race incident.
The team will be heading to Tuscany in two weeks‘ time for the Gran Premio d‘Italia Oakley, held at the Autodromo Internazionale del Mugello.
Photo credits: Yamaha Racing
“I was hoping to be able to get on the podium today. Still, it was a positive weekend, better than in Jerez. We started the race well and the pace was good. In fact, I arrived at the finish very closely behind our main rivals. Unfortunately, we lost out on acceleration, and because of that it was very difficult to stay with the front-runners, out of the corners they’re very fast. But during the weekend we worked well, and our bike was fast,” says Rossi as quoted from Yamaha Racing. “In the parts where you have to really ride hard, I was strong. At the end of the race I felt better, and I managed to stay together with Dovi, Petrucci, and Miller. I was hoping to overtake Miller, but I needed to be a bit faster to attack. Now, we immediately start thinking about Mugello. Let’s see if we can be a bit more competitive there.”
Photo credits: Yamaha Racing
“Honestly, I couldn’t do anything. I was trying to overtake Aleix at that moment. I think it’s important for us to understand the mistakes we made this weekend, which is mainly on Saturday with the qualifying strategy. When you start from eleventh on the grid, these types of race incidents are something you’re exposed to. So, we need to keep working to understand what we can improve.” “It started out as a perfect weekend and we ended it with zero points, so we have to learn from it. I’m sure I could have gone up many places in the race because I was getting into the rhythm. And even the podium wasn’t too far, just 2s. I think I would have been able to push and close the gap, but when you start from more towards the back it’s always difficult.