MotoGP Mid-Season Review - Part 2 Honda's Hell & The Importance of Dani Pedrosa

Whilst Yamaha have enjoyed huge success in opening nine rounds of the 2015 MotoGP World Championship, Honda have endured an absolute nightmare. With just two wins to their credit, and a bike unfit for purpose it seems, Honda have a mountain to climb in the second half of the season.

Marc Marquez had a lot of pressure on his shoulders coming into the season; he was still the man to beat, and his utter dominance of the 2014 season meant high expectation. Usually not an issue for Marquez, but it seems that he has succumbed to it. Qatar yielded a 5th place finish after an uncharacteristic first corner mistake left him fighting through the field, which in turn burnt up his rubber and left him unable to mount a challenge for the podium. Then it was business as usual in Austin, and it appeared the same in Argentina until the penultimate lap when he collided with Valentino Rossi at turn five and crashed out. A finger break between Argentina and Spain left him riding at under full capacity, but still to a decent 2nd. France saw him duffed up by Andrea Iannone, and he was only just able to beat the Ducati rider – who was suffering the effects of a broken collarbone! The Spaniard then went and crashed out of the Italian and Catalan Grand Prix whilst pushing for the win. Evidently, something was amiss.

But was it rider or bike?

Marquez is notoriously ruthless on track, and even he admits that he is very much a win it or bin it kind of rider. The first half of 2015 proved that he tended to bin it. But nothing was particularly new about his style from last year. Honda introduced a new engine to the RC213V at the Valencia test post-2014 and both riders complained that it was too powerful and that chassis development should be looked into instead. HRC didn't listen, and they paid the price. The engine freeze for factory entrants meant that Honda had to go down the electronic and chassis route to fix the issue, which it did to a degree in Holland. Most notable of the changes made was the revert to the 2014 chassis with the 2015 engine, swing arm and exhaust bolted onto it. Marquez was able to push much harder and consistently over a race distance, with the front-end and rear giving him the grip and confidence he desperately lacked in the preceding races. This allowed him to push Rossi all the way to the end in the race.

That race did however rattle the reigning champion. Marquez went for a desperate, but justified, attempt on the inside of the last corner on Rossi. But the Spaniard was heading into a closing door and the resulting contact sent Rossi across the gravel and onto the top step of the podium – a move Marquez felt aggrieved by. Rossi had beaten him in a straight fight and he didn't like it, and he made that very apparent post-race. Up until now Marquez has always had the measure of the Italian, and this is something Rossi has accepted. But what has always remained is the respect between each other, and that was something that seemed lacking after that race.

We've seen Rossi's and his competitors' relationships crumble before; Stoner, Biaggi, Gibernau, Lorenzo – take your pick. But the relationship between Marquez and Rossi seemed a little more solid than those, and I think this has left Marquez feeling almost betrayed because Rossi used one of his old tricks on him, not the other way around. This will be a crucial development in the championship battle as shoulder-to-shoulder combat between the pair may just become that little bit more aggressive.

That is if there actually is a championship battle. Marquez returned to winning ways in Germany, but has only won on the two bogey tracks of the calendar for Yamaha. He now sits 65 points behind the championship lead, but anything can happen in MotoGP and it usually does.

That statement reads true for Dani Pedrosa's 2015 season so far, and for the wrong reasons. The Spaniard had been suffering from arm pump all of last season and it reared its head again in Qatar. But it wasn't until then that he made the revelation to the media. He also revealed that he had surgery but that it didn't work, and that going for a second surgery may lead to further complications that could end his career. He soon decided that going under the knife was the only option and he subsequently missed the following three rounds. Progress upon his return at Le Mans was instant, and by the Catalan round he had remounted the podium after a fine ride to 3rd. A damaged thumb and clutch issues on his number two bike halted him in Assen, but a strong ride to 2nd in Sachsenring after a good scrap with Rossi showed that Pedrosa is very much back to full fitness.

He too has been struggling with bike issues, but not to quite the same extent as his team-mate. Pedrosa's smoother style allows him to work with the 2015 chassis better, but still doesn't allow him to push as hard as he'd like. The worry here is that Honda build a chassis specifically suited to Marquez and leave Pedrosa in the dark. This would be detrimental to the team. And it could actually have a bearing on the outcome of Yamaha's season – Dani has a bigger part to play in this championship than maybe seems obvious.

If Honda really have found something with the RC213V at the Misano test post-Germany and it translates to on-track performance then Marquez may still have a shot at a third title. Pedrosa's lost track time has seen him fall out of the fight, but he is still very much involved. Marquez will need a tail gunner in his pursuit of the championship and Pedrosa is very capable of that. But if it does become clear that the championship is over, then Pedrosa could cause a headache for the Yamaha riders. Dani has a point to prove in that he is still capable of winning races, so he doesn't really care about Rossi or Lorenzo and this could see the Spaniard take crucial points away from both. It wouldn't be the first time an 'outsider' has denied Rossi a championship; remember Toni Elias at Estoril in 2006? So, even though he isn't fighting for the title, Dani Pedrosa is one of the most important elements in it.

#motogp #repsolhonda #pedrosa #marquez