Monster Yamaha’s Maverick Vinales has labelled 2020 as the worst season of his career and takes little comfort from finishing as top works Yamaha in the MotoGP standings.
The Iwata factory riders - Vinales, Valentino Rossi and Fabio Quartararo - were made to look decidedly average by satellite Petronas M1 jockey Franco Morbidelli during the second half of the season as he took a 2019-spec bike to second in the championship.
Vinales, however, had to make do with sixth which put him five points ahead of Quartararo in the final analysis.
“At least I won this little championship. It’s something positive. But obviously, it has been a totally disastrous season. The worst season of my career. It’s hard to take that,” said Vinales
“But anyway, now it’s time to go home, stay calm, and it’s up to others to worry, I will work on myself.”
All three works riders have made suggestions - some would call them demands - to Yamaha about what needs to be done but the main problems remain a lack of top speed which leads to other issues.
“The problem is that when you get involved in the middle [of the pack], you are done. They overtake you on the straight, you have to brake very hard, the front starts to give up, so it’s everything in trouble,” said the Spaniard.
“As we always say, we have to start first and push. If you don’t do that, you are in trouble, you go backwards.
“Honestly, I just want to say that for sure it has been four or five races which have been a complete disaster for us. So we will see [for next year]. Right now, our potential is to be top ten. So it changes the movie quite a lot.”
