Since Yamaha entered MotoGP in 1973 the factory team has endured only two grands prix worse than last week’s Grand Prix of Europe – when Jarno Saarinen was killed at Monza in 1973 and when Wayne Rainey was paralysed from the chest down at Misano in 1993.
Last weekend was definitely the factory’s most disastrous from a technical perspective. Pretty much everything that could go wrong did go wrong.
On Thursday, the factory was penalised by MotoGP’s FIM stewards for using illegal engines at the season-opening Spanish GP. On Friday morning, Yamaha announced that one of Maverick Viñales’ pit crew had tested positive for Covid, requiring that crew member and four others to leave the circuit and go into quarantine.
On Friday afternoon Yamaha revealed that Viñales had exhausted his season’s supply of five engines, due to valve problems suffered with the factory’s first batch of engines. He needed a sixth engine to complete the season, which incurred the penalty of starting Sunday’s race from pit lane.
During the race the factory’s number-one title hope Fabio Quartararo crashed on the first lap, remounting to finish 14th and last, one place behind Viñales. Meanwhile, Valentino Rossi raced for the first time since completing his Covid quarantine, only to stop with an electrical problem. And Franco Morbidelli, who had won the previous race at Aragon to put himself in the hunt for the title, struggled to 11th with an over-pressure front tyre.
This was the first time since Valencia 2007 that Yamaha had finished a race without a single rider in the top ten. It was a very grim end to a very grim week.
This strange Covid-affected season has been particularly strange for Yamaha. The factory has won half the races – six of 12 – but it doesn’t feel like that because there have been as many low points as high points.
“We had a lot of expectations for the 2020 M1 but in reality we didn’t make a big step”
Quartararo has taken three victories, which put him on top of the championship for several months, but his title push faded because he’s failed to score any further podiums and he’s been outside the top seven at the last four races.
Last year the French rookie dazzled MotoGP. At five rounds he came within a second of defeating Marc Márquez. That made him the favourite to challenge the king in 2020. With a year’s experience he should’ve been stronger, instead he’s mostly been lacklustre.
Quartararo blames the 2020 YZR-M1, complaining that the bike is more nervous than the 2019 bike, used this year by Morbidelli to score two victories.
“The bike is totally different to last year and I’ve never felt like this bike is mine,” said the 21-year-old at Valencia. “Even when we achieve great races I never felt that good on the bike like I did last year; that’s my feeling. There’s something missing, so we are not comfortable on the bike.”
Valentino Rossi – contesting his 15th season with Yamaha’s M1 – agrees that something isn’t quite right
“We had a lot of expectations for the 2020 M1 but in reality we didn’t make a big step,” said Rossi on Saturday. “The 2020 M1 isn’t very different and it’s not a clear step forward. Also, if you look at the performance of Morbidelli, he’s having a fantastic season and he’s won two races with the old bike.
“It looks like we don’t understand something about the tyres. It’s incredible that last time a Yamaha won with Franco, but here in Valencia we struggle very, very much with grip. Yamaha has to try to understand the way to improve.
Rossi’s race return didn’t last long due to an electronics glitch
Yamaha
“I didn’t expect the Covid situation to affect the championship so much. It’s been really difficult because we often race at tracks at the wrong time of the year – sometimes it’s too hot, like at Jerez, other times it’s too cold, like at Le Mans, so it’s very difficult to manage. Also to race at a small number of circuits is difficult.”
The M1’s strength was always its balanced character – with its neutral chassis and smooth power delivery – which made the bike MotoGP’s strongest force for a decade or more. The M1 wasn’t always the fastest bike around a racetrack, but over a full season it worked better at more races than its rivals. A bit like Suzuki’s GSX-RR now.
Yamaha has worked so hard to increase horsepower that the M1 engine lost its easy-going engine nature and its reliability.
“For a long time the engine character of the M1 was a strong point for Yamaha, but now it looks like the other engines are smoother than ours,” added Rossi. “The engine department is our first problem because the performance isn’t fantastic. Also the reliability is critical and they made the mistake with the valves.”
To add to Yamaha’s woes there’s never been a worse time in MotoGP to have engine problems. Earlier this year the factories agreed to freeze engine development until the end of next season, due to the financial effects of the Covid pandemic. Therefore Yamaha, like everyone else, will have to use 2020 engines throughout the 2021 championship.
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