Fabio Quartararo gets Ducati comparison: “Rear is not helping the front”

After the opening three rounds of the MotoGP season, Yamaha finds itself, to the surprise of many, fifth and last in the constructors’ standings.

The high grip provided by six days of pre-season testing at Sepang flattered the latest M1’s performance and the factory failed to put any riders inside the top ten at either the Thai or Argentine Grands Prix.

Qualifying has been more promising, with a ninth for Jack Miller at COTA Yamaha’s worst Saturday morning session.

The Austin races then saw Yamaha rise to best-of-the-rest behind Ducati, with Fabio Quartararo sixth in the Sprint and Miller taking the factory’s best grand prix result since 2023 with fifth in the main race.

Fighting so closely with the class-leading Desmosedicis in the Sprint also gave Quartararo - MotoGP’s last non-Ducati champion in 2021 - a chance to see precisely where he is losing out.

“In straight braking, we are quite OK,” he said. “But where you have to brake with lean angle, like Turn 15, compared to them, they really stop the bike with both wheels, and we stop only by the front.

“So trying to follow them, I was really pushing the front, making some mistakes, but also some good saves. So we have to improve our rear, not only on the traction, but also on how to stop the bike.”

The Frenchman believes what he was experiencing is a symptom of a bike balance issue.

“The braking is not the problem. The bike is not well balanced. The front feeling I would say is maybe one of the strongest even [compared] to the Ducati. I can really feel everything I have on the front.

“I'm using a lot of front brake compared to them. But they really use both wheels to stop, even on the sliding. We only brake by the front and if you put lean angle with a lot of front brake it’s quite tricky...

“[Fortunately] I can really feel the limit and pick up the bike before the front is completely closing. So like I said, it's a strong point that we have on the front.

“The problem is I have a really good front and bad rear… The rear is not helping to really stop.

“It's difficult also on acceleration, on mid-corner. Even on changing direction the bike is sliding a lot.

“So it’s something that we are trying to work a lot on, to find the balance on the rear and find much more grip.”

Adding to the complexity for Yamaha is that team-mate Alex Rins was initially “struggling more with the front than with the rear” in Austin.

“I saw [Quartararo’s] data and he's braking later than me. But to copy his setup is quite difficult because we have different riding styles," Rins said.

Rins duly “changed the set-up quite a lot” for the grand prix, “and it was positive.

“Step by step I recovered, and I was able to finish in P11. We will keep working, and let's see if we can have a good feeling in Qatar.”

This weekend’s Qatar round will start with Pramac’s Miller as the top Yamaha in tenth place in the world championship, three points ahead of Quartararo.

“He is riding really good,” Quartararo said of Miller at COTA.