Reigning MotoGP world champion Marc Marquez says he "doesn't agree" with the new rules imposed on Michelin, which prevents it from making any major tyre changes during the year.
In a bid to provide some stability with the tyre allocation, Michelin has been banned from making any radical changes to its tyres outside of any safety reasoning, having introduced numerous profile changes to the rear and a stiffer construction front in 2017.
As a result, Michelin has already finalised its allocations for each race weekend, though Honda's Marquez believes “flexibility” in the choice of options from Michelin is necessary in the event a tyre does not work properly at a certain circuit.
“I don't agree [with the new rule], because depends of the season, depends on the tyre,” Marquez said during Thursday's pre-event press conference in Qatar.
“We have some new tyres we don't know how will work in another track.
“So we need to have some flexibility, because as we have the flexibility inside the team to try a new thing and maybe go back to the old one, we need to also have this with the tyres.
“We have a few new compounds that we tested in a few tracks. In some tracks they were working wel, in some tracks they were working not so good.
“So you cannot fix that new compound for example, because we don't know it works in other tracks.”
Ducati's Andrea Dovizioso admitted the tyre situation could be something of a lottery for each rider, but thinks the stability in the allocation will allow for more focused bike set-up work during a weekend.
He said: “Yes, in one way you have to be a little bit lucky because the tyre you have has to fit your bike and your riding style.
“But on the other side, with the stability, you are able to work more on the bike.
“So it's a balance like always, positive and negative, just during the weekend you can understand if it's better for your bike or worse.”
Valentino Rossi agreed with his compatriot's point regarding stability, while the Italian likened the situation to the final years of the Bridgestone era.
“It's more similar to the Bridgestone time, because Bridgestone had a very high potential,” the Yamaha rider added.
“But [there was] no development in the last four or five seasons, so the tyres were always the same.
“For me [the new rule] is good, it can also be positive and negative, but I think now the tyres reach a good level, so it's good to have the same tyres for all of the season.”
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