Marc Marquez has apparently made an offer to Honda to waive his fee for the 2020 World Championship, in which he actually only took part in the first GP of the season in Jerez. This is the indiscretion reported by our Spanish colleagues at AS.com, who also report that Honda refused to endorse the idea.
Marquez signed a contract that ran until the end of 2024 in early 2020. This brings the number of seasons on the Honda, the only MotoGP motorcycle ever ridden by the Spanish champions, to eleven who has been struggling since July to recover from that damn injury and get back into the saddle. In the past few weeks, rumors have surfaced of possible manufacturer-driver friction, and this move seems in some ways designed to cool the mind and strengthen a partnership that is likely to last for a long time.
Knowing the mentality of the Japanese, the rejection of Marquez’s offer is understandable. Honda is a colossus that certainly doesn’t need Marc’s tremendous dedication to move forward and, above all, a gesture like that of the driver can only be appreciated by the Japanese managers.
Marc’s participation in the Qatar Tests seems very unlikely, but many watchers are betting that the Spaniard will return to the bike by the end of the first part of this season. In Losail, Pol Espargarò and Stefan Bradl will be there, But at Honda they know very well that only Marquez is capable of winning with her bike and his absence on the starting grid is like a boulder on HRC’s overall competition in MotoGP while they wait all the while to see how quickly Espargarò will adjust to the new one Bicycle.