Luca Marini having a “fantastic weekend” in Austin but tyre vibration continues to drag down Honda
Despite making tangible progress in multiple areas, Honda has still not found a cure for rear chattering.
Luca Marini says he is having a “fantastic weekend” in the Americas Grand Prix, but feels a persistent rear vibration issue is holding back Honda in MotoGP.
The progress Honda had made over the winter break was again evident on Saturday at the Circuit of the Americas, as Marini qualified inside the top 10 and battled with Pedro Acosta and Ai Ogura in the sprint to finish in eighth place.
Marini had already scored a decent haul of points in the main races in Thailand and Argentina, but this marked his first top-nine result in a sprint race in 2025.
Having had a chance to directly compare his RC213V against the KTM RC16 and the Aprilia RS-GP, the Italian was buoyed by how the Honda was performing at the resurfaced Austin circuit.
However, he explained that the Japanese manufacturer still hasn’t found a fix for the chattering issues that plagued its performance last year, saying he is haemorrhaging a lot of time due to rear vibration.
"A fantastic weekend until now. We are doing an amazing job here,” he told MotoGP’s official website.
“We improved the bike a bit compared to Argentina and my feelings here are super good. I can ride the bike very well and I can push at the limit.
“This morning in qualifying I made a very good lap. Also in the race, the pace was not so bad, but I think it could be better.
“We had some vibration during the sprint race like always. When the rear tyre goes down we start to have this kind of vibration that doesn't let us achieve a better position in my opinion.
“The potential is even higher but still we need to understand this and how to solve this because we are losing a lot of time during the lap.”
Marini’s teammate and 2020 MotoGP champion Joan Mir could have helped Honda secure a double points finish in the half-distance race in Texas, but he crashed out on lap 5 after qualifying eighth on the grid.
Mir found that the RC213 lacked pace when running in a pack during the early laps of the Americas GP sprint.
“Honestly, riding alone my pace is inside the top four,” he explained. “But during the race you have to handle a lot of bikes that are probably a bit more powerful than our one.
“It's our weak point at the moment and it's not easy to handle that. It will not be easy tomorrow to handle it.
“I will try to do the best I can and try to be a little bit more careful with the mistakes and try to bring some points home.”
