Maverick Vinales says Yamaha has finally given him a “good bike” after finishing sixth in the season-opening Qatar MotoGP race.
Vinales struggled for much of the pre-season with the new YZR-M1 and its electronics, citing the Thailand test as the worst of his Yamaha career.
Having to go through the first qualifying session in Qatar, Vinales was left a distant 12th on the grid while Tech3's Johann Zarco was just over a second clear in pole on a two-year-old satellite M1.
Vinales made a breakthrough with his bike during Saturday's FP4 session, and says he has now “recovered the feeling” with the Yamaha which was absent during testing.
“In the race I felt really good with the bike, better than I did before,” Vinales said following the opening round.
“We followed the direction of how I wanted the bike and we improved so much, especially our rhythm.
“Now that we have done that, we know we have a good bike and we can focus on improving other things.
“Honestly, during the tests I didn't try many starts, I was focused on the bike, so the start was bad.
“However, now we've recovered the feeling with the bike – especially for the race – we can work on other areas.”
Vinales' improved feeling on the bike was such that he felt, had it not been for his poor start, he could have fought for the victory.
He added: “We found a good set-up, but we can still improve and match the electronics more to my riding style, and we can also work on the starts.
“When you finish a race like today's, you wish that the next GP would be held the next weekend.
“We're quite motivated. I felt that, if I had been more towards the front today, I could have had a chance to win the race.
“I'm happy the team did such a great job, especially on Saturday in the afternoon. We found something good for our riding style and that's perfect.”
