(Motorsport-Total.com) – The once successful MotoGP manufacturer Honda has been fighting for years to keep up. While Marc Marquez celebrated a total of six titles between 2013 and 2019, his serious arm injury at the beginning of the 2020 season meant a turning point – not only for the driver, but also the team.
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LCR team boss Lucio Cecchinello sees positive changes at Honda Zoom
Honda lost its way in development and fell further and further behind in comparison to the increasingly strong competition. At the end of the last racing year, Marquez also canceled sails and switched to Gresini-Ducati.
At that point, Honda had already started to work on restructuring in the background and to learn something from the working methods and mentality of the now more successful European manufacturers in the field.
Honda before a decision: stay or go?
Lucio Cecchinello, whose LCR team has been running Honda machines since entering MotoGP in 2008, knows what a crossroads the Japanese brand was at.
“Last year, due to the lack of competitiveness of the bike, Honda came to a point where they had to make a decision: either invest more in the MotoGP project or withdraw,” he admits in an interview with the Spanish edition of Motorsport.com a.
“Honda decided to stay because the DNA of the company comes from motorcycles, even if they are now building rockets for space,” explains the LCR team boss, showing the direction that the top management of the Tokyo company is taking last hit, satisfied.
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“What I see this year is that a lot more Honda people are involved. The board is determined to restore the competitiveness of the MotoGP project.”
Honda is also reorganizing its personnel for 2024
“It starts with a greater willingness to make financial resources available,” says Cecchinello. And this goes hand in hand with the fact that a lot has happened in terms of personnel. Technical director Takeo Yokoyama was replaced by Suzuki’s Ken Kawauchi just over a year ago.
At the last Japanese Grand Prix, Shinichi Kokubu, the head of the MotoGP project, was replaced by Shin Sato. And the next to go is general manager Tetsuhiro Kuwata, who will hand over his position to Taichi Honda in April.
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So the team seems determined – despite Marquez’s departure – to move from last place in the manufacturers’ table back into the regions where he should actually be. And a large part of his strategy is to work hand-in-hand with LCR toward that goal.
Cecchinello is already seeing more efficient ways of working
“This year Honda changed its approach to motorcycle development,” says Cecchinello. “Until now, the initial analysis was carried out by the testing team, which then passed the parts on to the factory team, who in turn assessed whether they were good or not. Only then did they come to us as soon as they were available.”
“Now the test team does its analysis and the parts are distributed to the four regular drivers at the same time. HRC receives the results and data from all four drivers at the same time. This is a much more efficient system,” praises the LCR team boss.
His garage with Johann Zarco and Takaaki Nakagami was therefore in constant communication with that of the factory team during the MotoGP tests in Sepang and Qatar.