Mighty Honda has admitted that they made a mistake with their new 800cc bike and that they have some work to do to improve it. Italian Magazine Motosprint published an article that quotes Satoru Horiike, managing director of Honda HRC:

“We must recognise that we made a mistake in setting our target, our bike needs a more powerful engine.

The limit we set ourselves for the first year of 800cc wasn’t the right one. It was thought that the 800s would have taken more time to beat the 990s, but they managed it immediately.

Our bike it not at the level it should be at this point of the season. We are improving top speed, but it is not enough.”

Honda is now fully concentrating on the development of the bikes for their factory team Repsol Honda and once they have sorted them out, they will start to concentrate on the bikes of their satellite teams. Satoru Horiike said:

“All efforts are concentrated on the works team, that’s the priority. We’ll think about the other bikes later. Let’s wait five or six races, then we’ll see what kind of help we can give based on the results.”

Marco Melandri, who is putting in some decent results, will not be happy with this.

The managing director also said that reigning worldchampion Nicky Hayden is working hard to adapt to the bike.

“Nicky is making a big effort to adapt to the bike. He’s trying to change his riding style. For him this bike is harder than for Pedrosa, but we’re trying to meet his needs.”

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