QUARTARARO REPORTS UNEXPECTED FUEL ISSUES AT MISANO AS AUSTRIA THREATENS FOR YAMAHA

Fabio Quartararo’s San Marino Grand Prix at Misano ended with a 10th-place finish, but the Monster Energy Yamaha rider left the weekend focused on a problem he says he didn’t see coming: fuel trouble that forced him to ride with major restrictions from the start.

Quartararo qualified 13th and fought his way forward, believing he was “not so far from P6” during the race. However, he described a constant battle with consumption and confusing information from the bike’s electronics. After the race, he said: “We had many difficulties with the fuel during this race, I don't know why. In the dashboard I had the lights and the lights were completely crazy, so I was a bit lost.”

He added that for much of the event the motorcycle was effectively warning him he could not make it to the finish. “We have to play because we can't use all the power we have, and at the end I don't know why that today we struggled a lot,” Quartararo said. He explained that the bike was running “a lot in the red,” which he interpreted as a sign that the situation was not healthy. “Straight from the beginning, so I was using less power than what we have,” he continued, adding that he was “struggling and also in the straights I was super-slow.”

Even with the limitations, Quartararo felt he still managed a respectable pace. He said he used three engine maps during the race, with map three being the leaner option. “So I make most of the race with the map three, that I was a bit under-potential, and even like that I make 1m31.7s, 1m31.8s, so I was not super, super-bad.”

When asked whether switching to the less-powerful map helped extinguish the fuel warning, Quartararo replied that it did not. “No, it stays,” he said. “So it stays and then basically [if the light is] red you don't finish the race.” He then described the endgame: “So basically I was without fuel just going into the pit lane.”

Misano is generally a circuit associated with higher consumption, but Quartararo’s concern was heightened by the contrast with his rivals. In the post-race press conference, Marc Marquez, Alex Marquez, and Pedro Acosta all said they did not have fuel issues during the race.

Looking ahead, Quartararo suggested the Misano experience could carry into the next round at the Red Bull Ring, which he called “really difficult.” He pointed out that Austria’s stop-start nature makes it a particularly demanding venue for consumption, and he admitted he was surprised Misano had been such a struggle for Yamaha. “Really strange, I didn't expect to struggle so much here [with fuel at Misano],” he said. “Because it's not a track that usually we struggle, so Austria will be really difficult.”