After a rapid sixth to first drive at the season opener in Qatar and a fight from an eleventh to a fifth (and only two seconds before the win) on the Doha lap, Maverick Vinales found himself in a kind of time leap in Portimao on race day.
Although Vinales started the weekend the fastest in FP1 and only refused pole because of a tiny violation of the track restrictions, he finished the race in eleventh place – exactly where he crossed the finish line in Portimao last November.
On this occasion he was 18,685 seconds away from KTM race winner Miguel Oliveira, while the gap was increased to 23,761 seconds on Sunday by victorious team-mate Fabio Quartararo.
That was mainly because Vinales dropped to 20th place on the first lap, then to 21st and not long after that. The Spaniard finally made progress on lap 9 of 25, but even with accidents it was too late to crack the top ten.
Vinales, who set the tenth fastest lap of the race, half a second off Quartararo’s best, stated that he just didn’t have enough rear grip. This also suggests that he will be the second factory Yamaha rider after Valentino Rossi to repeat last season’s troubles.
The # 12 had used the medium rear tire in the last practice session and then switched to the hard rear tire for the hotter race conditions, but Quartararo won with the same tire selection.
On the subject of matching items
“It’s pretty hard to understand whether [the hard tyre] was a mistake, “said Vinales.
The Spaniard has resigned himself to losing places at the beginning until Yamaha and the other factories own a front holeshot machine, but believes that a top 5 position would have been possible without the qualifying penalty on him 12th place at the start.
“In the beginning we know we have a problem. We can’t improve until we get something new,” he said, referring to the front holeshot device.
“If we start in the front row, however, we have a completely different race. Not to be won because I didn’t have the pace today, I had very little grip on the bike and I couldn’t do anything unbelievable, but at least.” be in the top five.
On the subject of matching items
“We have to try to reset our heads. We know we can be fast. So we just have to keep working and stay calm. Honestly, even if it was a very bad result, it wasn’t that bad.” End.
“But we have to understand what the problem was during the whole weekend because I was only able to drive fast on the last attack. We were slow for the rest.”
With Yamaha focusing on resolving last year’s staggering form over the winter, which meant it won more races than any other manufacturer but still missed out on the three titles, Vinales admitted that there is a problem that is Motorbike behaves so differently than Qatar.
“It’s difficult to keep the focus and especially the motivation when you see that you can win the first two races, then get to the next track and have trouble getting into the top ten,” said Vinales.
“It was a tough, tough race. I can’t explain why. The feeling was the same all weekend, very little rear tire grip. I only had good grip on the second tire of qualifying which made a big difference, and if so I didn’t cancel my lap, was good enough to be on pole position.
“So we had problems all weekend, we didn’t find out why.
“But it’s time to review, see, and improve. Because [otherwise] We will deal with the same topic as we do every year, we will start to win and then we will gradually slow down.
“That’s not positive. We have to keep working like we did and see if we can find something. Sure we can get something out of this race because it wasn’t normal what I felt on the bike.
“So let’s think positively and now we’re going to Jerez, a track that is very good for us and especially for me, and we’ll see. We’ll try to work harder to get even better.”
Yamaha Team Director Massimo Meregalli said: “It’s a day of two extremes for the team. Maverick couldn’t find the trust he was looking for in the early stages.
“But he did a good damage control. He kept putting the pressure on and because of the many falls, the five points he scored today are all the more valuable.
“We’re going to look carefully at what kept Maverick from getting the feeling that he needs to be more competitive in this race in order for him to come back stronger at Jerez.”
After the race, Vinales brushed off rumors and criticism on social media before taking a sheet of friend Jack Miller’s book and deciding this is it It is best to avoid social media after a bad resultwith Vinales even Closing his Twitter account.
Vinales is third in the world championship and 20 points from Quartararo in the Jerez round next weekend.