MotoGP championship leader Joan Mir admitted when he jumped off of his Suzuki after last weekend's Aragon Grand Prix that the pace of the Honda scared him. Factory rookie Alex Marquez cut through him effortlessly like sharpened steel and piled the pressure on race-winning team-mate Alex Rins to end up second.
Mir somewhat backtracked on those comments on Thursday ahead of this weekend's second instalment at Aragon, noting: "This is something I said after the race, I saw Alex was coming from the back with a lot of speed and he was turning quite well. I said this thing but now I don't really agree. It's true they have a lot of potential with this bike, but not especially scared from the Honda."
Much has been made of the step forward Honda riders have taken in recent rounds. At the post-San Marino GP test at Misano, a number of updates were introduced. One of them was a new rear shock absorber from Ohlins, which Suzuki has been playing with for much of the year. The nature of Aragon suits the Honda, with Marc Marquez winning five times at the circuit in the premier class.