Marquez: Michelin “has to see their problems” when MotoGP tyre issues arise

After the standard 2022 tyres suffered with blistering at the pre-season test at Mandalika in February, Michelin elected to bring a stiffer tyre carcass that hadn’t been used since 2018 to better cope with the extreme heat in Indonesia.

Having topped the February test, Honda was the worst affected by the carcass change as its riders battled with a severe lack of rear grip.

This culminated in Marc Marquez suffering a violent crash in warm-up on the Sunday of the race, which resulted in a concussion and the return of double vision problems that have currently ruled him out of this weekend’s Argentina GP.

Honda hasn’t blamed Michelin for Marquez’s crash, but team boss Alberto Puig did hit back at comments made by Michelin boss Piero Taramasso – who suggested Honda simply didn’t understand the tyres – in an exclusive statement handed to Autosport.

Ahead of this weekend’s Argentina race – which has had its Friday sessions cancelled due to freight issues – Alex Marquez says what happened in Indonesia “can’t happen again” and feels Michelin’s response to the situation was only to save face.

“I think it’s something that they need to improve for the future, it’s something that cannot happen again,” Marquez, who struggled to 13th in Indonesia, said when asked by Autosport if he had confidence in Michelin right now.

“To suddenly change a tyre allocation, I mean we were there [in Indonesia] for three days of testing because they [Michelin] asked for three days there to try the tyres.

“We saw it was clear the tyres didn’t handle 27 laps, but for the future I think it will be interesting to not change the casing and all that and putting back a casing that for three years was not in the allocation.

“So, if the tyres cannot handle 27