Yamaha and Valentino Rossi could cross their paths again. Lin Jarvis confesses to courting the Mooney VR46 team.
In Valencia Fabio Quartararo and Yamaha try the last shot of the tail, but it will be difficult to think of winning and hope that Pecco Bagnaia finishes 15th or outside the points. In motorsport, everything is always possible up to the checkered flag, but it would take a miracle to reconfirm world champions. It is difficult to bridge the gap of 23 points from the Ducati leader, but sometimes nervousness plays tricks …
In any case, in Yamaha it is almost time to take stock and Lin Jarvis, managing director Yamaha, is somewhat objective. Considering the technical supremacy of the Ducati GP22 over the M1 2022, when Quartararo was in command at +91 “at that stage we were beyond expectations“. Obviously it hurts “having lost the top two races to go, Pecco was very far away at a certain point. His recovery was impressive … he made some mistakes and Ducati was still not in place with the factory bikes at the beginning of the World Championship, then they found the way and that changed the game“.
Yamaha tries to blow the VR46 team from Ducati
The championship is not over yet, but hopes and expectations are now diverted to next year. On Tuesday in Valencia there will be an important test, the first of the 2023 preseason, where perhaps we will see the latest evolution of the engine of the Yamaha M1. The arrival of engineer Luca Marmorini, former Ferrari and Toyota in F1 as well as an experience with Aprilia in MotoGP, is mainly oriented towards giving more horsepower to the four-cylinder.
Unforgivable the mistake of not having been able to make the necessary changes to the engine in the previous winter break. Then when the championship began, Yamaha also lost the satellite team, as well as the leadership in the standings. In 2023 we will only see two M1s on the track, but Lin Jarvis has long been courting the Mooney VR46 team’s Valentino Rossi. “We are open to the hypothesis… It would be the logical evolution“, Admitted the British manager.
But to convince the team headed by Alessio Salucci it will be necessary to field a highly competitive bike as early as next year and cross your fingers. Because the Mooney VR46 Racing Team is contractually linked to Ducati until the end of 2024, but Lin Jarvis would like to convince them to close one year early. “It is up to us to prove that the bike will be competitive“. All that remains is to wait for the start of next season.
