Quartararo top as Ogura impresses at Shakedown

Fabio Quartararo (Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP) ends a busy Shakedown Test from January 31 to February 2 in Malaysia as the fastest, the only rider to dip into the 1:57s with a 1:57.794. That gave him three-tenths of breathing space over new Yamaha stablemate Jack Miller (Prima Pramac Yamaha) in second, with Honda HRC test rider Aleix Espargaro making a late lunge into third with his last lap of Day 3. But the stories go beyond the timesheets!

Fabio Quartararo

THE ROOKIES

Ai Ogura (Trackhouse MotoGP Team) kept impressing, fourth overall and 0.414 off Quartararo. The reigning Moto2™ champion also did a longer run of laps in a race simulation, and was a few tenths quicker over the course of 17 laps than the top Aprilia finisher here last year.

Ai Ogura

Fermin Aldeguer (Gresini Racing MotoGP) had a slightly bigger deficit to the Japanese rider on Day 3, sixth and 0.627 off the top. He was the only rider to crash all test, but no harm done after he tipped off and rejoined at Turn 9 on Sunday.

Fermin Aldeguer

Thai rider Somkiat Chantra (IDEMITSU Honda LCR) remained a little further off as he put in his second day on track at the Shakedown, having sat out Day 1.

TALKING POINTS AT A GLANCE

Yamaha reportedly had new chassis and swingarm for Quartararo and teammate Alex Rins, and updated aero. Quartararo was top and Rins seventh.

Miller’s laptime was only half a second off his qualifying at the Malaysian GP last year on a different machine. At the Barcelona Test, his laptime on the Yamaha was 1.2 seconds off his quali at the venue on his previous bike.

Miguel Oliveira was P8, and the final Yamaha on track on Day 3 was new test rider Augusto Fernandez, who was also focusing on adapting to the bike rather than testing items as yet.

Pol Espargaro was fifth for KTM, and Dani Pedrosa ninth. The biggest thing to break cover so far is the new items at the rear spotted on Saturday.

Pol Espargaro

Aprilia had test rider Lorenzo Savadori working on a different spec of 2025 machinery, but notably it seems rookie Ogura was also trying some new parts – already.

Michele Pirro continued shaking down everything to prep for the arrival of Ducati Lenovo Team duo Marc Marquez and Francesco Bagnaia. Later in the day, updated aero broke cover, as well as the chassis seen on one of MM93’s runs at the Barcelona Test.

At Honda, Aleix Espargaro led the charge on Day 3, his name appearing on the timesheets three times after splitting his workload across different machines. To compare his 1:58.106, the fastest Honda in Q2 at the 2024 Malaysian GP which was Johann Zarco with a 1’57.971 for CASTROL Honda LCR.

Aleix Espargaro

Amazingly, Aleix Espargaro’s Q2 lap that day was a 1:58.107 on his previous machine – a single thousandth slower than his Shakedown Day 3 with Honda.

Now it’s two days R&R – ish – in Malaysia as action starts again with the Official Test from the 5th to the 7th of February.

source: MotoGP