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Repsol Honda RC213V - Capabilities?

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MagicMarc93

Joined Apr 2019
125 Posts | 26+
GB
Jorge Lorenzo is a dime a dozen "racer" who'd struggle at club level racing, he doesn't know one end of a bike from the other and hasn't achieved anything at all in his time at Grand Prix level.

Since he joined Repsol Honda he has been amazingly competitive, so the RC213V must be an amazingly easy bike to ride and anyone could win on it.

Oh..hang on..Jorge Lorenzo is a 5 time world champion who is uncatchable on his day and can extract every ounce of performance out of a bike with laser like precision...

And also now I think about it he's never even been top ten in 5 races on the Repsol Honda and showing few signs progress..

Makes me think the Repsol Honda is not as great a bike as people say...therefore makes me think Marc is winning despite the bike not because of it.

Hard for anyone to disagree really.

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MagicMarc93 said:
Jorge Lorenzo is a dime a dozen "racer" who'd struggle at club level racing, he doesn't know one end of a bike from the other and hasn't achieved anything at all in his time at Grand Prix level.

Since he joined Repsol Honda he has been amazingly competitive, so the RC213V must be an amazingly easy bike to ride and anyone could win on it.

Oh..hang on..Jorge Lorenzo is a 5 time world champion who is uncatchable on his day and can extract every ounce of performance out of a bike with laser like precision...

And also now I think about it he's never even been top ten in 5 races on the Repsol Honda and showing few signs progress..

Makes me think the Repsol Honda is not as great a bike as people say...therefore makes me think Marc is winning despite the bike not because of it.

Hard for anyone to disagree really.

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I'm not a huge Jorge fan, adapting quickly to change doesn't seem one of his stronger points. He took a full season and then some before he could get a win on the Ducati.

No other rider on the grid can ride quite like Marc.

The Honda is developed for Marc first before anything or anyone else.

Probably why nobody else can get as much out of the bike as he can? A great bike for Marc but not so great for anyone else.
 
@ AJV80

Thanks for your well worded reply and I do take your point about Lorenzo appearing to be slow to adapt however with regards to the RC213V being developed for Marc, whilst that may be true tight now Marc won the World Championship on his very first attempt with surely minimal development time specifically for him.

He appears to be able to adapt to all conditions too, I just think if he got on any bike (possibly excluding the RS-GP) he'd be a championship contender straight away.

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I remember an interview a few years ago where Marc compared his Repsol GP bike to a 450cc motocross bike, in that you really have to work the bike with your upper body. I know Marc and a couple other riders do train regularly on MX bikes, and I think that provides a training advantage for them.
 
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Hollywood said:
I remember an interview a few years ago where Marc compared his Repsol GP bike to a 450cc motocross bike, in that you really have to work the bike with your upper body. I know Marc and a couple other riders do train regularly on MX bikes, and I think that provides a training advantage for them.
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Hmmm...I guess you could be right about that Hollywood...looks like it is an extremely physical machine that needs muscled around.

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MagicMarc93 said:
Jorge Lorenzo is a dime a dozen "racer" who'd struggle at club level racing, he doesn't know one end of a bike from the other and hasn't achieved anything at all in his time at Grand Prix level.

Since he joined Ducati he has been amazingly competitive, so the GP17 must be an amazingly easy bike to ride and anyone could win on it.

Oh..hang on..Jorge Lorenzo is a 5 time world champion who is uncatchable on his day and can extract every ounce of performance out of a bike with laser like precision...

And also now I think about it he's never even been top ten in 5 races on the Factory Ducati and showing few signs progress..

Makes me think the Factory Ducati is not as great a bike as people say...therefore makes me think Dovi is winning despite the bike not because of it.

Hard for anyone to disagree really.

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Corrected to apply to 2017 and the Ducati. This best shows how flawed your reasoning is.
 
RCV600RR said:
Have a look at what I've changed from your post in the quote.
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Ah ok sorry I see....and I do actually half agree with you but I think the general consensus at the time was Jorge wouldn't be competetive in his first year on the Desmosedici and his second year was going to be a full on title assault....he even said so himself.
With the RC213V however we were all being told (especially by a certain element) that he'd hit the jackpot as the Honda is such a piece of cake to ride. That clearly is not the case.

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IMO only of course and I sense some sarcasm and to me, there is no way that the Honda is the best bike on the grid but at the same time using Lorenzo to determine that is fraught with danger based on his history at Ducati of being a slow adapter. For my thinking, a far better measure is actually Crutchlow who has been riding the Honda for a few seasons and you could therefore do a fair comparison across years between he and Marquez.

Lorenzo should only come into the measure when he starts to get to grips with the equipment and gets all to his liking, as again history has shown that he needs this to be able to produce and be competitive.

Of course, that in itself also does not mean that the bike is not brilliant but that it may well be a difficult beast to get setup but once within its 'operating window' it may well become quite an easy beast to ride (relatively speaking when we talk of MotoGP machines).

Essentially, it is a difficult thing to measure as we have a rider/team on a machine with many years experience, a bike designed around and with them in mind opposed to a rider who in the same timeframe has ridden for two other brands with two different teams (teams being mechanics/engineers etc as well as brand teams), each with their own idiosyncracies and internal ways that would have been different.

Now in saying that, I do believe that some riders adapt far quicker than do others so would not expect all to struggle in the manner that Lorenzo has, which again indicates that he may be a significant contributing factor ............ just how much as against the bike we can debate until the cows come home
 
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Hi Gaz,

Great post and made me reconsider up to a point, thanks for taking the time to reply.

Any sarcasm you detected with the initial "Lorenzo being a dime a dozen racer" was actually just to draw attention to the topic and a little tongue in cheek.

As to the debate in question I accept Lorenzo seems to be slow to adapt but the lack of a top 10 finish after 5 rounds (one of which is his self confessed favourite track) points to some serious issues with the bike.

Agreed the topic of "is it the bike or the rider?" could be debated till the cows come home but does that mean it's not worth discussing?

Due to the popularity of this thread and the high quality of the replies I'm intending starting similar threads for Yamaha, Suzuki, Ducati etc.


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MagicMarc93 said:
@ AJV80

Thanks for your well worded reply and I do take your point about Lorenzo appearing to be slow to adapt however with regards to the RC213V being developed for Marc, whilst that may be true tight now Marc won the World Championship on his very first attempt with surely minimal development time specifically for him.

He appears to be able to adapt to all conditions too, I just think if he got on any bike (possibly excluding the RS-GP) he'd be a championship contender straight away.

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Click to expand...

I agree, Marc could win on a bike with flat tyres if he had too. The guys ability on a bike is at another level, on top of that he works extremely hard at all other aspects of the sport and race weekends. His debut MotoGP season was unbelievable, 2015 not so much due to a new chassis I think (and Marcs win it/bin it approach). Honda's electronics package was argued to be state of the art around that time (and the best amongst the factories) and even that didn't help him in 2015 with his Chassis woes. I'm not trying to argue that Marc won his first world title because he had the best electronics, because thats simply not true, it was his amazing talent that won him that championship.

But Marc clearly gelled with his 2014 bike and going forward from 2015 the factory steered the bikes development path (at least from a chassis standpoint) more towards the 2014 bikes characteristics. Although the 2014 bike was not developed with Marcs needs in mind, I think its fair to say that it was a pretty good fit and starting platform for his style and needs (even if not by pure chance and luck). Also having arguably the best electronics package in the paddock would have given the team engineers the best tools for masking any of the bikes weaker points. But i agree with you, Marc would be a championship contender on almost any bike in the field given the right team and support behind him.
 
MagicMarc93 said:
As to the debate in question I accept Lorenzo seems to be slow to adapt but the lack of a top 10 finish after 5 rounds (one of which is his self confessed favourite track) points to some serious issues with the bike.
Click to expand...

Same thing happened on the Ducati. Dovi was smashing him. It didn't mean that the Ducati was a bad bike. Lorenzo takes time to adapt (almost eighteen months on the Ducati).
 
RCV600RR said:
Same thing happened on the Ducati. Dovi was smashing him. It didn't mean that the Ducati was a bad bike. Lorenzo takes time to adapt (almost eighteen months on the Ducati).
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It’s still very early but I think it is fair to say that this years version of the RCV is the easiest to ride in quite some time. The fact that Marquez and the other riders don’t have to make up all their time in braking is huge for Lorenzo IMO.
 
Can't agree with that, yes Marc is getting the results but Lorenzo is doing nothing and regardless of what anyone says he is a top top rider, if it was that easy he'd be achieving something, surely at least a top ten at his favourite track (Jerez) especially as he's telling us he's back to full fitness.

His Ducati time is incomparable.

Crutchlow is talking us the front end of the '19 RC213V is a nightmare, no feel at all, it just lets go.

It's Marc that's making the difference.

Livio Suppo now free from HRC quoted in a Speedweek article saying if it wasn't for Marc HRC would be in real trouble.

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