Fabio Quartararo shared that he had a frustrating weekend in Argentina, as he struggled with poor race pace. The 2021 World Champion’s race didn’t start well, as Marco Bezzecchi collided with him at the first corner, making his battle even tougher.

“Maybe I could have finished a couple of positions higher, but realistically, it was always going to be tough,” Quartararo admitted in an interview.

Despite the setback, the French rider managed to fight his way up from last place to finish in 15th, later being promoted to 14th after Ai Ogura was disqualified. Meanwhile, his Yamaha teammate Alex Rins finished as the top Yamaha rider in 11th place.

The only bright spot for Yamaha was qualifying, where Quartararo secured seventh place. But when asked if there was anything positive to take from the race in Thailand, he responded:

“For me, there is nothing positive. Maybe the one-lap pace—qualifying was acceptable because we were only a tenth and a half off the front row. But in terms of race pace, it was a disaster,” he said.

With two Grand Prix races behind him, finishing 15th and 14th, Quartararo is holding back on making any bold predictions for the next round in Austin.

“Every time I expect something, the opposite happens,” he admitted. “So I prefer not to expect anything.”

Both Honda and Yamaha have technical concessions that allow extra development time, but they’ve had very different starts to the season. While Honda is sitting second in the constructor standings, Yamaha has fallen to last place, even though they showed good pace during pre-season testing in Sepang.

“When you do five days on the same track, the grip level is super high, with a lot of rubber down,” Quartararo explained. “Even a single test day after a race weekend puts us much closer to the front than during an actual GP. So imagine five full days of testing—it makes a huge difference.”

The problem is that once race conditions change, Yamaha’s struggles begin.

“When the conditions aren’t perfect, or we overheat the tyre even slightly, it’s really difficult. Also, trying so many things this weekend made it even tougher.”