Marc Marquez gathered Santi Hernandez and Honda to ‘feel part of Aragon victory’
"They also suffered with me. They helped me a lot"
Marc Marquez says he gathered his old factory Honda MotoGP crew ahead of the San Marino Grand Prix to tell them to “feel part of” his Aragon win.
The eight-time world champion ended a 1043-day wait for another MotoGP grand prix victory after dominating at Aragon to score his first win on the Gresini Ducati.
Marquez elected to quit Honda after 11 years at the end of 2023 to join the Gresini team and ride a GP23 in order to be competitive again, following several difficult seasons on the RC213V.
He was unable to take any of his old crew from Honda aside from tyre technician Javi Ortiz to Gresini, though continues to consider them as family.
Asked on Thursday if he had spoken to his former crew chief Santi Hernandez, Marquez said: “Yesterday, I went to the Repsol Honda garage and I gathered all the group and I said ‘feel part of this victory’.
“Not only Santi, but they also suffered with me. They helped me a lot in the very deep moments.
“So, that part of the garage, I want to say on the personal side that they also feel part of my process.”
After his final race with Honda in Valencia last year, Marquez remarked in his media debrief that the squad would be “the team of my life”.
Hernandez also wasn't allowed to come to Gresini as a crew chief for Marquez as, at the time, the latter declined to sign for more than one year.
Prior to last weekend’s Aragon GP, Marquez’s previous win came at Misano in 2021, while the Spaniard has won four times in total at the Italian venue in the premier class.
Looking ahead to the San Marino GP, Marquez believes his target for 2024 is now complete after Aragon and is looking to start on Friday with the feeling on the bike he had in Austria.
“Of course, my target - at least for this season - has been done in Aragon,” he said.
“So, now it’s time to keep working. Of course, after that weekend we can breathe a bit more but we need to use that extra boost, that extra confidence to keep going and keep working.
“With the team, with the bike we learn something every race.
“Ever race we find something and we feel better. It’s true that I would like to start here basically with more or less the same feeling as Red Bull Ring - that will be enough for me, because there the feeling was already good and I know that Aragon was very special conditions.
“Not because of the surface, I would say because of the storms during the night. But these three guys [Martin, Bagnaia, Bastianini] will be super fast and we will try to be close to them.”
