Yamaha MotoGP star Fabio Quartararo has kept most of his complaints about the YZR-M1 under wraps but two underwhelming results at the Red Bull Ring have finally given rise to the Frenchman speaking his mind.
As well as suffering with serious brake issues on both weekend, the series leader has cited other issues that are affecting his performance, the largest of which is top speed, and has called on Yamaha to get their shit together.
"Really not positive. We need to understand what happened because actually we saw all the weak points that we have on the bike. It felt so strange because honestly, I thought that the potential was higher," said Quartararo, speaking at the track.
"I was behind Aleix all the race, and I can see that the bike was struggling in many areas that I was not expecting. So apart from the problems from the brakes, we had many other problems. Number one is the top speed.
"We need to find the solution to this because this will be a problem at Barcelona, Aragon and Valencia, where there are a lot of straights."
Quartararo, like Franco Morbidelli and Valentino Rossi, used Brembo's evolution disc setup last weekend but it proved not enough while Maverick Vinales pushed the stock setup to the point of explosion.
During the race, it was at the maximum. The lever was coming every time more soft. So it was arriving to [the point] that was going to have no brakes. So really dangerous, and no confidence.
"Of course we are a title contender, but I don’t feel as confident as Jerez, because in Jerez everything was okay. Everything was going so well. But it looks like every time we have more problems and we have to study," Quartararo said.
"This was a really tough track for us, but last year I had a really nice feeling. I finished third. It was so different to the feeling from last year.
"It’s not only me. Okay, Valentino made a way better start than me, but everybody is struggling. So it's not easy to be in this kind of situation.
"Let’s see what’s happens for the next races. We are struggling way too much with the bike during these three weeks. It’s impossible to fight for a championship with this kind of problem and really irregular races.
"Misano will be a better track for us, but Yamaha needs to work a lot to fix the problem and to fix what we asked them to do for the next race."
