Quartararo has made no secret of his displeasure at an apparent lack of progress from Yamaha in getting more top speed from its bike and said in pre-season testing that he’d already reached the limit of the 2022 M1.
The reigning world champion could do no better than 11th on the grid for Sunday’s 22-lap season-opener under the floodlights in Qatar, but was still predicted by rivals to be strong in the race.
However, Quartararo was unable to advance on seventh after a strong opening lap and was ultimately pipped to eighth by Pramac’s Johann Zarco by 0.007 seconds – with the Yamaha rider 10.543s off of winner Enea Bastianini.
With all five of Yamaha’s manufacturer rivals finishing ahead of him in Sunday’s Qatar GP, Quartararo admits going forward that he “cannot be confident” in the package he has.
“Well, knowing that last year we won both races and now we finish basically behind, quite far back, of course I’m worried,” he said.
“I will not…
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