Day 1 of Honda test at Sepang with Bautista and Márquez

The riders of Honda had their first MotoGP test day at the Sepang Circuit, where we can see two of our own giving it gas: on one side the rookie Marc Márquez, and on the other the Team Gresini rider, Álvaro Bautista. Both have traveled to Malaysia to make the most of these training days ahead of the end of the season and the entry into force of the ban, so these are days to make the most of and get the bike ready for 2013.

This test is not official, it is private, and alongside the two Spanish riders we have also been able to see Kousuke Akiyoshi and Takumi Takahashi, two of the test riders of the Japanese brand, so there has been a lot of work. Unfortunately, the rain has once again made an appearance; it’s no surprise that when we talk about MotoGP, it starts to rain. So the conditions have not been the best, and they had to wait until 11 in the morning to get out on track.

Despite the rain that fell during the night, the session took place under intense heat, which at 11 a.m. was completely unbearable at 33º and 59% humidity. Furthermore, from 2 p.m. the rain returned and left us without much more action. Up to that point, the Go&Fun Honda Gresini rider had been able to complete 24 laps, being the fastest man of the day with a lap time of 2:02.19. He then went back out on track in wet conditions, being the only one of those present to do so; it’s clear he has a lot to test, and today especially he has been trying out the new updates to his Showa suspension and also some of his Nissin brakes.

For his part, Marc Márquez again saw how the rain left him with reduced time to keep adapting to his new machine, but he was able to complete 26 laps of the Malaysian track, with a time of 2:03.65, being the second fastest of the day, and then decided not to go out in the wet to avoid risks. As for the test riders, both were in charge of evaluating the RC213V 2013 prototype: Akiyoshi completed 32 laps with a lap time of 2:04.21, while Takahashi recorded 2:09.91 over 18 laps.

Let’s see if they can make more of the second test day at Sepang.

Source | MotoGP Official website