The 2023 MotoGP preseason is over. Exactly two weeks from now, the first race of the World Championship will begin in Portimão with the cards already dealt after the last test session on the Portuguese track: the Ducati are scary, they took 7 of the top 8 positions, with the champion Pecco Bagnaia destroying the clock, Quartararo’s Yamaha is the closest to it… and Marc Márquez with his Honda is still far behind: he closed the test in 14th position.
If the pre-season tests are to be trusted -the only possible reference-, the Ducati should not have too much opposition in the first race of the championship, on March 26. They have started the year as they finished the previous one: being the fastest bike. This winter, they have monopolized the six days of tests: first in Valencia (Luca Marini), in Sepang (Bezzecchi, Martín and Marini), and now in Portimão, with the two days dominated by Bagnaia.
The champion, of the official Ducati, impressed on the last day. He led the time table and smashed the Algarve track record – which was his, from pole position in 2021 – by 7 tenths.
Although, to tell the truth, up to 12 pilots exceeded that reference time. From Bagnaia to the Aprilias of Espargaró (10th), Oliveira (11th) and Viñales (12th). Symptomatically, they were left without lowering him from the Honda -Joan Mir 13th and Marc Márquez, 14th- backwards.
At Honda they trusted that the last two days of testing would serve to analyze new adjustments and parts that would bring the winged motorcycle closer to its Italian competitors. Marc Márquez was testing “great things” on the first day and on the second, the tires for the race on the 26th, he made only one time attack that provisionally brought him closer to 9th place (0.6s behind Bagnaia), but as soon as the Ducatis put on the softest compounds, Marc dropped back to 14th place, 8 tenths behind the Italian.
At least, the Catalan was able to get closer to Bagnaia from one day to the next, from 1s3 (19th on the first day) to 0s8 (14th), that is, five tenths, half a second less. Although, compared to Sepang just a month ago, the progress is not seen too much: Marc in Malaysia was 10th, 7 tenths behind Luca Marini.
Analyzing his times in long runs in the last test in Portugal, the 93 is not so far in pace with Bagnaia: he rode a run of 11 consecutive laps (a simulation of a Sprint race) with a more or less constant pace in a low 1m39s, while that Bagnaia completed two long runs (of 12 laps) with most laps in 1m38s and low 1m39s.
