Fabio Quartararo’s first assessment of new teammate Alex Rins

LCR Honda rider Rins will move to Yamaha to take the place of Franco Morbidelli in the 2024 MotoGP rider line-up, alongside Quartararo.

Rins is the only non-Ducati rider to produce a grand prix victory this season so could test 2021 world champion Quartararo in different ways.

“Concerning Alex, it’s a new challenge for the team and for him, also for me,” Quartararo said. 

“He has a lot of experience in totally different bikes.”

Rins, representing Suzuki, out-scored Quartararo in the 2019 and 2020 seasons.

He will displace Morbidelli who, in four seasons together, out-performed Quartararo only in 2020.

“I spent almost all my MotoGP career with Franco, we have known each other a long time. I wish him the best,” Quartararo said about his outgoing teammate.

Quartararo was restricted to 15th at the British MotoGP - a result so disappointing, he exchanged a funny tortoise emoji with the equally-annoyed Marc Marquez via social media afterwards.

“The first part of the season was not what I expected,” he admitted.

“You need to look forward. The summer break was good for me. 

“We feel, and know, that we’re not ready to fight for a podium. We need to do everything great for a great result.”

Yamaha managing director Lin Jarvis added: “The first half has been disappointing, without doubt. Compare last year’s first half to this year, it’s disappointing. 

“We expected to do better, we haven’t fulfilled our objectives in the first half. We’ve been struggling frequently, we’ve only made two podiums. 

“It’s not up to the standard that we’re accustomed to, and where we want to be. We have a lot to work on, and a lot of things to improve upon in the future.”

Jarvis detailed Yamaha’s issues: “The engine is one of the positive things. In previous years we have struggled with top speed and our riders were unable to be competitive in many situations on the straights. 

“The engine has definitely been a positive change. Some people are critical of it but it has solved one problem - it doesn’t give us an advantage, but it has reduced the disadvantage that we had in the past. 

“We’ve seen other manufacturers make steps forwards in the chassis and handling areas, this used to be our forte. 

“We no longer have any advantage in the chassis area. This makes it difficult to fight. 

“We are struggling in qualifying and, in this format, there is no time to extract the best from our package. 

“We have only two riders on track. We are on the back foot in every race event. 

“This creates difficulty for our riders who are having to ride beyond the limit - we’ve seen crashes, fights, problems. 

“It’s difficult if you’re not qualifying well to make good race results.”