Reigning MotoGP World Champion Marc Marquez has admitted he is unsure about Honda's new aerodynamic fairing, which he tested on Monday at Sepang.
Repsol Honda has adopted a 'hammerhead' design, in the same vein as what Ducati, Aprilia and Suzuki raced with in 2017, after HRC test rider Hiroshi Aoyama trialled the new fairing during a private test last week.
Marquez, along with team-mate Dani Pedrosa and factory-contracted LCR rider Cal Crutchlow, spent the day evaluating the new fairing and was mixed in his reaction to it.
The Spaniard revealed it helps control wheelies under acceleration and offers more braking stability, but found the bike harder to manoeuvre through faster corners.
With Marquez a notoriously hard braker, he also conceded he feared the added weight from the downforce generated by the fairing into corners could overstress the front tyre.
“Th main target of the new fairing is the wheelie, try to stop the wheelie, try to have more downforce, then you lose a little bit of top speed,” he said.
“Of course braking stability, if you have the wings, becomes better, but then when you start to go in (it) looks harder. The bike on the fast corners also looks a little bit more hard.
“I think with the new fairing we need to find a good bike balance, because for one lap I can ride well, fast, but to be consistent I'm scared a little bit to overheat the front tyre, or something like this.”
Marquez ended Monday's session seventh on the timesheets with a 1:59.730s, but was caught out by spots of rain in the final 15 minutes of the day and crashed at Turn 2.
“Unfortunately, when we fit a new tyre at the end of the day, it started to rain a bit,” he said.
“I lost the front at Turn 2, even though I wasn't really pushing, but it wasn't important.”
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