Racing At The Mandalika Circuit Awaken Repsol Honda From Beautiful Dreams, MotoGP 2022 Turns Into Disaster

Repsol Honda's appearance in MotoGP 2022 was so disappointing. (Photo: Instagram.com/@hrc_motogp)

JAKARTA - Repsol Honda's performance in MotoGP 2022 is very disappointing. The RC213V motor is not able to compete with motorbikes from other manufacturers, not even the satellite team.

Repsol Honda boss, Alberto Puig, did not deny this fact. He said the 2022 Mandalika MotoGP in March was the start of a nightmare for his team.

Since racing in Indonesia, Honda realized they had a problem with the new RC213V motorcycle. "We thought the 2022 motorcycle was very competitive, but in the end we were wrong," said Puig.

He said that the first test and race had allegedly provided information that was not true, so that the Honda mechanics team misread the situation.

"Since the Mandalika MotoGP in Indonesia the situation has gone from bad to very bad, and we have reached a point where we know what happened," said Puig.

Repsol Honda has indeed shown a promising start to this season. Their rider, Pol Espargaro, dominated the pre-season test, followed by his success in taking pole and finishing third in the Qatar MotoGP.

At that time, Honda felt they were on the right track. But then the situation actually changed 180 degrees at the 2022 Mandalika MotoGP. Honda's performance graph continued to decline after that. No Honda rider was able to climb the podium until the half-season break.

"We are not in a good position to fight back, and that is a consequence of not finding a good plan for the 2022 bike. Nobody is happy with this situation and it is not easy to solve problems," said Puig.

"We thought we had a problem with the chassis and we tried several solutions, but so far we haven't got a complete answer."

Now Repsol Honda is trying to improve faster. In the second half of the 2022 MotoGP which will be held in August, Puig said Honda's main focus is to improve the performance of the RC213V in order to achieve better results, especially next season.

"The most important thing now is to try to improve the ability of the motorcycle and return to the normal level of Honda in MotoGP. We will continue to try, even though the situation makes us walk backwards," said Puig.