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“If I don’t finish last, I think that’s a victory!”
Remi Gardner’s ‘win’ was the result of a tyre pressure penalty imposed on Honda test rider Stefan Bradl. The headline figures were rather unflattering – 50 seconds off the win, and 33 seconds off his team-mate Fabio Quartararo, which is more than a second per lap, which is a lot on a small MotoGP circuit like the Sachsenring.
But that would be a dishonest falsification. MotoGP is no longer the championship that allowed Troy Bayliss to emerge and win, nor is it the MotoGP that allowed Jonathan Rea to outpace Casey Stoner and finish eighth and seventh.
You only have to look at the progress of someone like Michele Pirro, a regular Ducati rider, over the years to see how specialised and difficult things have become for those coming from the cold.
Of course, Gardner was coming in from the cold. He had received a call from Yamaha the previous Sunday when he was competing with fellow intermediate champion Tito Rabat in motocross.
There is no prior testing, no knowledge of bikes of the same breed. You only have to look at Franco Morbidelli’s season at the start compared to now to see the difference it makes.
But also, it wasn’t more than a second per lap, not the entire weekend. A race where Gardner damaged his rear tire due to his inexperience and was nearly two seconds off the lap at the end didn’t reflect the true picture of the weekend.
Instead, taken as a whole, he suggested that a world-class Superbike rider could be a really valuable asset to Yamaha’s MotoGP programme too – even if it probably wouldn’t affect the rider’s full-time plans.
Reconnect
After his unceremonious exit from KTM’s MotoGP programme, Gardner switched to the MotoGP World Championship – which meant switching to production machinery and Pirelli tyres and having to reprogram his brain accordingly.
It’s clearly a very complex process and can be traced to the fact that Gardner has been on a clear upward trajectory during his year and a half at GRT Yamaha so far, targeting a top-five finish in this year’s championship.
Then suddenly, he had to adapt again to Michelin tires, except on an unfamiliar bike.
“I was riding it on the first run like I was riding it with a Pirelli – a lot of lean angle, all the way to the kerb, and the guys were [here] “I’m trying to get back on track and start driving. But I think it’s going to be better with the Yamaha,” Gardner said. “But I made some adjustments before FP2 and I felt pretty competitive, but not too bad to be honest. I was ahead of the Honda, which was great.”
He was a little damaged when he crashed at the end of Friday, leaving himself with bloody fingers for the rest of the weekend, but finishing the day one second ahead of Quartararo – and looking closely outside of time attack mode – was truly impressive.
That was the closest Gardner has come – he was a second behind in qualifying, but should have been closer again had he done a full lap on the second tyre. “For me, Remi is doing a very good job in his first race,” Quartararo said.
Yamaha
Riding the new Yamahas and feeling comfortable on the bikes – and looking comfortable on the timer screens – would have been a non-issue a decade or even five years ago. But if you listen to all the riders who have ridden the newer M1s, the bike’s comfortable, easy-to-use nature is now little more than a cliché.
Gardner also seemed to be following suit in the end. He was initially comfortable with the mechanical side of the car, but soon realized the aggressiveness of the engine.
“I think Yamaha has always had a reputation for being a smooth, easy-to-ride bike. But I found it a bit aggressive, to be honest,” he says.
“Maybe it was the engine package or something, but I found it more aggressive than I expected. It’s very difficult to control the slides and control the throttle.
“I’ve had many moments in fact, at the end of [main] The race, even in the fast race, had some tough moments. But luckily I was fast as a cat, and saved the day.
“But yeah, I expected it to be smoother. The real engine doesn’t make a lot of vibrations and noise, it’s nice but… just… a bit over-the-top.”
This is in line with the reactions of his peers, as is most of Gardner’s observations in general. While his suggestion that the bike was “really good on the brakes” may surprise Quartararo – who spent the German Grand Prix weekend confirming that the M1 struggled in all areas, with no real trump cards to rely on – Gardner focused on speed over the lack of performance on the exit of corners.
“We only lost 20%, finishing the corner and keeping a tight line to drive.
“On the edge of the cliff. Edge of the cliff and grip. We’re missing some rear grip. The other guys can just finish the turn on the gas, they can keep the tire line a little bit, lift it and drive. Whereas, you know, touching the gas here and it’s always a little bit of a slide, you’re always looking to lift it a little bit early, trying to find grip.
“It feels like a dance at the moment. It’s not about finishing turns and moving forward. It’s just my feeling – obviously you shouldn’t take my word for it.”
Quartararo complained of the same problem, slippage through the successive left-hand corners in the middle section of the track and a general lack of grip, but said: “The more laps he does, the better he gets.” [Gardner] The more he did it, the more he saw that this [a lack of grip] “It’s just a small part of our weaknesses.”
Race
Despite Quartararo’s obvious frustration with the M1’s performance at the Sachsenring, he still managed to push it to the brink of the top ten in both races.
No wonder – Quartararo was once renowned as a qualifying specialist, but he’s actually turned his performance trends around in these uncertain times for Yamaha. He was weak last year and prone to losing a straight qualifying clash here or there to Franco Morbidelli or Alex Rins, but as long as conditions were normal and arm pumping was avoided, he was reliably ahead of both of them in the sprints.
It was hardly surprising that it proved to be a tough benchmark for Gardner, who finished 12 seconds behind his nearest rival – lamenting his lack of “explosive power” early in the race, which could have been down to MotoGP rust but could also have been a reflection of the M1’s struggle to exploit the new tyres. He was a little closer to Quartararo midway through the main race (shortly before his rear tyre proved to be ineffective).
He was ultimately an active participant in the races rather than a spectator, which is all you can ask of a racer who comes in with no real preparation.
“He was very professional and it was great to work with him,” said Yamaha team manager Mayo Meregalli. “He was able to handle the situation really well.”
the future
Does any of this mean that Yamaha, which now has two more factory contracts to offer (assuming it re-signs Rins) to riders for its new Pramac lunar team, should move away from the likes of Miguel Oliveira and Sergio Garcia and bring in Gardner?
Probably not, no. Even Gardner himself probably wouldn’t say that.
At the very least, though, it means Gardner could now be the first name in Yamaha’s phone book if it needs a MotoGP rider for the weekend – depending on the desire/enthusiasm/fitness of test rider Cal Crutchlow.
“It’s great to think that Yamaha has put me so high up in the riders’ standings,” he said of his call-up, and the German Grand Prix weekend showed that it was the right choice. But the circumstances of the call-up shouldn’t be ignored either – Yamaha had no other choice. Owns Rins was replaced in accordance with MotoGP regulations, as not enough time had passed since Assen to require a fill-in.
With Crutchlow suffering from an injury of his own, it would have been the most predictable thing in the world if Quartararo had ended up flying the flag alone at the Sachsenring.
Instead, she handed Gardner the keys and even gave him some good development stuff.
Only Yamaha will know how good the feedback he got, and only Yamaha will know how valuable Gardner is to them as a future MotoGP asset – and whether they can afford to risk jeopardising that by dividing his focus.
But with Crutchlow not getting any older, with many MotoGP factories looking to sign two test riders anyway, and with Yamaha allowing maximum testing and development during the season thanks to the current state of its bike, there is certainly a path here for Gardner to carve out a MotoGP-adjacent career, two years after his main MotoGP career ended.
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