The Márquez, Rins and Pedrosa ready for the race in Japan

This weekend brings the seventeenth round of the Motorcycle Grand Prix World Championship season, we arrive at one of the most legendary circuits, the Motegi Circuit, and all of this after some rather peculiar races at the previous round at Phillip Island, so we’re in for excitement, tension and plenty of action on Honda’s home turf.

Márquez arrives at the penultimate round of the championship with a chance for the second time to mathematically clinch the MotoGP World Championship, although it won’t be easy, as his teammate Dani Pedrosa knows the Japanese track very well and has won there two consecutive times, so the 26 will be ready to delay his teammate’s title celebration.

After a chaotic Sunday affected by changes to the race distance due to tyres in Australia, including a pit stop, the hopes of Marc Márquez of winning the coveted title in the premier class at the last round were dashed. However, the calendar offers him a new opportunity just a few days later. The challenge will be to score 8 points more than Jorge Lorenzo and for Dani Pedrosa not to cut into his lead by more than 9, in a scenario that suits the rider from Castellar del Vallès well, who over the last two years has managed to extract every ounce of performance from his Honda.

A round in which attention in Moto3 will focus on the thrilling battle for a title that Álex Rins has heated up with his sixth win of the year. The Repsol rider has continued to progress, showing a consistency that has allowed him to accumulate 13 podiums and arrive at the penultimate round of the year just 5 points behind the leader, Luis Salom. It will be a race in which Álex Márquez could once again act as the decider, thanks to his recent forays onto the podium, which last Sunday slipped away from him on the final lap.

Statements from Dani Pedrosa:

Australia was a strange race, but I’m really happy with my team, which did a great job and we secured second place. I always look forward to Motegi, it’s a great race for Honda and I enjoy the circuit. It’s the last of the three races on this tour and we’re all tired, so it’s important to maintain concentration. The track has many heavy braking zones and acceleration; we must find a good set-up to achieve stability under braking and good traction out of the corners.

Statements from Marc Márquez:

Obviously I’m disappointed after Phillip Island, but these things can happen. The important thing is that once again we showed we were ready for the race and were competitive. Now we must leave it behind and focus on Motegi. The track conditions can vary quite a lot and we will concentrate on the set-up for the strong acceleration and braking, which is an area we have now improved. We’ll work hard from the start, following our usual planning, and we’ll give one hundred percent to recover after Australia.

Statements from Álex Rins:

Motegi is a very beautiful, very peculiar circuit, and we’re closer to the lead of the World Championship, just 5 points behind, but we’re not going to pull out the calculator at any point and we’ll keep the mentality of taking it race by race. Once again, it will be important to be fast from the first practice sessions. In the last two races we’ve found it quite hard to find the best set-up for the bike, so we’ll see if from the start we manage to ride comfortably. Last year wasn’t bad for me, but we’ll see what happens this season. In 2012 we arrived with a different bike and it isn’t a reference, because in some cases where I went well a year ago, now I’ve found it harder, and conversely, places where we didn’t go so well, this season everything has come much more easily. We’ll see.

Statements from Álex Márquez:

Now we’re heading to a circuit of the kind they call stop-and-go, that is, with big braking zones and strong acceleration, where we’ll need to do a good set-up especially to have good stability on corner entry. Last year wasn’t our best weekend, but neither were Australia and Malaysia, where this year we’ve gone much better. We’ll have to be very focused from the first practice session to try to maintain the good feeling we’ve regained with the bike. That keeps us very motivated and I hope I can recover a bit more physically, which will be important for having a good weekend.

Don’t miss Pedrosa commenting on the Motegi Circuit. Everything is set for the penultimate round of the 2013 season.

[jwplayer file= http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vuJswwZXlc]

Source | Repsol Media service