Foundations laid with productive double top ten Saturday in Buriram
Chang International CircuitHonda HRC Castrol made yet more progress during an electric Saturday at the Chang International Circuit, Joan Mir battling into seventh and Luca Marini avoiding incidents around him to recover to tenth.
Back to the typical conditions expected of the Thai GP, hot conditions saw lap times tumble in the build-up to the very first Sprint of the year. Excitement was palpable and built throughout the day as the return of racing steadily grew closer and closer.
Joan Mir took full advantage of his strong Friday to start tenth on the grid for the Sprint, immediately making progress forward with a trademark aggressive start. The first race of the year saw several ambitious moves into the opening corners, leaving the #36 with ample space to advance further. Settling into the rhythm of the race, he’d battle with Brad Binder until the closing laps and taking seventh place. This is an improvement of two places over his 2025 Thai Sprint result.
Lining up in 14th on the grid after late yellow flags in Q1, Luca Marini took a wide line into the first corner and quickly progressed into the top ten. Fighting hard with Bagnaia on the factory Ducati, the #10 was able to maintain his early gains and cross the line in tenth with a comfortable margin over Alex Marquez. This marks an improvement of five places over his 2025 Thai Sprint result.
Honda HRC’s engineers have one more evening to assess the data and make final adjustments before the 26-lap Thai Grand Prix arrives and another MotoGP World Championship season continues on at pace.
“I am satisfied with the job we’ve done today, it is what we were missing last year – getting a solid result in races where we can’t be fighting deep in the top five. It’s what will make the difference at the end of the year. At the start of the weekend, I said that it would be tough and we have been working a lot to improve our situation. In the long race on Sunday, I think we will be stronger. It’s important to have a race like this at the start of the year so we can map our progress well and not lose our way.”
“I am satisfied with the job we’ve done today, it is what we were missing last year – getting a solid result in races where we can’t be fighting deep in the top five. It’s what will make the difference at the end of the year. At the start of the weekend, I said that it would be tough and we have been working a lot to improve our situation. In the long race on Sunday, I think we will be stronger. It’s important to have a race like this at the start of the year so we can map our progress well and not lose our way.”
“We had to work hard to stay inside the top ten today after gaining some positions at the start. There are still some things to improve on the bike, certainly we have made some steps forward but in the race, you can see that still there is some margin between us and the others. Today’s heat made the front tyre very critical, even with the big improvements we made to the braking area it meant we had to be very careful, and we lost one of our strengths. There are still new things we are trying, still finding new improvements and still planning for more in the future. It’s the first race and we are pleased with this first Saturday.”
“We had to work hard to stay inside the top ten today after gaining some positions at the start. There are still some things to improve on the bike, certainly we have made some steps forward but in the race, you can see that still there is some margin between us and the others. Today’s heat made the front tyre very critical, even with the big improvements we made to the braking area it meant we had to be very careful, and we lost one of our strengths. There are still new things we are trying, still finding new improvements and still planning for more in the future. It’s the first race and we are pleased with this first Saturday.”
