Track Report by Alberto Puig [Repsol Honda Team - Team Manager]

How is Takaaki Nakagami after his fall?

Taka unfortunately suffered a small tear in the tendon of his small finger. He went to Barcelona Hospital after the race to check and clean the wound. In theory he should be OK to race in Motegi, but it was important to check the injury and have it properly taken care of before he got on the plane.

It was an unlucky moment for him and Marc Marquez.

Yes, everything that happened was a racing incident. Marc made a very good start but then he had a small moment and the rear wheel slipped, which then caused contact with Fabio Quartararo. Unfortunately, Quartararo was very close and the contact was unavoidable. In turn Marc started to have this problem with the rear and after Turn 5 he couldn’t even keep the bike straight and Taka was behind…

On TV it looks like Marc moved to the left.

Yeah, exactly, because he could not keep the bike straight due to the issue with the rear. Taka was unfortunately very close, they made contact and he fell. It was a racing incident and very unlucky for all three riders. We know that Fabio is fighting for the title so this makes it even more complicated for him.

Marc is back after more than three months, what’s the feeling?

He made a fantastic start. The feeling is that he was ok returning to the bike for the first time since the Mugello race. The most important point is that Marc is back riding and competing on race day is now part of his recovery process. We try to help him recover by racing, this is the target for the last races – help him get stronger and return to his true form.

We are flying to Japan after three seasons.

Yes. After this very difficult pandemic period we go to our ‘home’ and we hope that things will go better for all of us with the Japanese fans and many of our colleagues there to cheer for us and support us. We will keep trying to do our best and we hope to have a better weekend.

And finally, we have a Wild Card with Tetsuta Nagashima.

It’s important for HRC and also for him as a rider. It will be his first race in the MotoGP class. It will be very interesting to see what Nagashima can do in this Grand Prix. We can see his level compared to the riders who are regularly racing in MotoGP.