Marc Marquez blames ‘the tyres overheating’ for sprint crash

The eight-time world champion made another great start as he looked to recover from a nightmare qualifying.

However, Marquez soon crashed out of points contention when he lost the front-end of his Repsol Honda at turn 14. 

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“This is a difficult weekend, our pace has not been too bad but we made a big mistake during Qualifying practice and starting down in 20th is a big battle,” said Marquez. 

“In the Sprint race I started really well in the first two laps and made up a lot of positions, but when you push like this you overheat the tyres and I lost the front. 

“We got back up and finished the race, getting the information for the team which is necessary for tomorrow. 

“Finishing 21st or 15th in the Sprint doesn’t really change much. We go again tomorrow.”

A rare sight since he joined Honda for 2023, Joan Mir out-qualified Marquez and positioned himself well to try and get a decent result. 

But like his more experienced team-mate, Mir also went down before re-joining the race and finishing last.

Mir added: “An intense day with the conditions and what we had to do. I was able to keep improving my feeling throughout the day and our times weren’t too bad as we went into Q1. 

“If we did this time last year we would have been on the front row I think! But we still need to find more speed in Qualifying. 

“Again, starting where we did made the race a bit complicated and falling at the last corner was not ideal. 

“We got back on and finished the race to get as much information as possible for Sunday.”