The progress of the Honda RC213V in MotoGP 2025 is becoming clear, with the manufacturer now able to fight within the top ten. However, the road to the top is still long, and Luca Marini believes that the upcoming Jerez test in a few weeks will be essential for further developing the bike.
The Honda HRC Castrol rider praised the improvements made, not only compared to 2024 but also since the start of the current season:
– As in the past, it’s a very agile bike, not physical and super easy to ride. The performance is still sometimes difficult to extract, but we made a very good improvement. Compared to the bike we had here last year, we have a completely different bike, and it’s much better. But I think it’s also slightly better compared to how we started this season.
Marini then emphasized the importance of maintaining effort and motivation: ‘We did a good job, this is the direction, and we need to keep working like this because now that we are getting closer to the good positions, we have to get even more motivation. Because it’s only a matter of time before we can achieve great results’.
Regarding the need to improve top speed, the #10 rider pointed to the Jerez test as a key moment: ‘We have some plans, some things to try. I think the Jerez test is the first moment where we can try something big. So, we are just playing a bit with a few things – on the electronics side, settings of the bike to have a better acceleration. We are doing a good job also in that area, but if you have to do the race fighting with KTM, it’s a bit difficult at the moment’.