LCR Honda reveal new MotoGP bike and a new rider line-up, too
Team look to build on strong 2020 with Nakagami and new boy Alex Marquez
LCR Honda officially unveiled their 2021 liveries and riders over the weekend, with Alex Marquez (Castrol) and Takaaki Nakagami (Idemitsu) looking to build upon encouraging 2020 campaigns. Nakagami remains for a fourth year with the team and is seeking to cut out any mistakes in order to launch a championship challenge on a full-factory, latest-spec RC213V – the first time he’s received the newest bike.
“I believe that we can be more consistent and be able to fight for the top spot, or at least fight for the podium,” Nakagami told MCN. “My target for this season is to fight for the championship, so I must fight in every race to stay with the top group. “Last season there were a few mistakes during important moments. In Aragon I was too excited from pole and made a stupid mistake, but it’s important experience. We cannot make any mistakes this season because our target is to fight for the championship. If we have more confidence, we could be okay!” Marquez moves across from the Repsol Honda team and enjoyed an impressive end to his maiden MotoGP campaign by picking up podiums at Le Mans and Aragon, silencing his critics in the process. One key area to improve is qualifying, with Marquez only making it through to Q2 on two occasions, with a best grid slot of 10th at Aragon 2. “Normally on Sunday I have good pace, good rhythm, but starting from the back makes it difficult to improve,” Marquez said. “In the end, everybody has a similar pace, you
‘If we have more confidence, we could be okay!’
always need to be there, one tenth down or up. You lose a lot of time in the first laps. We calculated at some races I was losing four second on the first lap, seven seconds in the first three laps. It’s impossible to recover this so I need to improve.”