The end of Honda’s crisis in MotoGP does not seem to be in sight. The last title was in 2019, and there have been no victories since 2021, with the situation dragging on. Currently, the RC213V is the least competitive bike on the grid, but test rider Stefan Bradl believes there are means and a will to turn things around.
The German rider told GPOne.com that making progress is essential, even for having leverage when choosing riders: ‘Yes, we need to improve our material. At the moment, it is not good enough. You can compare our situation to that of Mercedes in Formula 1. If the vehicle is not competitive, you will not have the best rider on the market. I imagine that at Red Bull Racing there were several top riders in line before they re-signed with [Sergio] Pérez. At Mercedes, on the other hand, they cannot get the champions they would want to hire after [Lewis] Hamilton decided to leave’.
Bradl emphasized that Honda has the necessary resources to get out of the situation it is in: ‘The positive side: Honda has a reasonable budget for MotoGP, which is important if we want to catch up with Ducati and the others in the near future. It seems clear to me that Honda wants to see improved results. Because the most successful manufacturer in the history of GP racing needs a new success story in the near future. Our tragedy has been going on for three years now’.
Although the current regulations only have two more seasons until a new era arrives in 2027, the German believes that Honda wants to return to good results before then: ‘I am convinced that Honda wants to get closer to the front even within the current rules, and then launch another major attack for 2027. This is my personal opinion. The Japanese are very calm people, they are very patient. But they are also very proud – and therefore a company like Honda always has the intention to put something big in motion’.