Jack Miller shrugs off Yamaha V4 "hiccup" as “par for the course”

Jack Miller played down the significance of Yamaha’s day two absence at the Sepang MotoGP test, insisting the kind of “hiccup” that put the V4’s track activities on hold was “par for the course” with a new machine.

The Pramac rider had put the V4 on top of the MotoGP timesheets for the first time on day two of the previous Shakedown, then began the official test with 14th on the timesheets, 1.406s from reigning champion Marc Marquez.

But plans to switch attention from new parts to a base set-up came to a halt when an unspecified technical issue for Fabio Quartararo and Toprak Razgatlioglu during day one saw Yamaha call a halt to day two.

Fortunately, after overnight investigations in Japan and Italy, the green light was given to resume testing on the final day, albeit with reduced running.

“It's a hiccup, but it is what it is,” shrugged Jack Miller. “You'd be extremely naive if [you thought it was possible] to build a bike in nine months to race against the best in the world and not have a day like we had yesterday. It's par for the course.

“So the boys busted their arse last night to find a solution and get us back on track. Not only the guys here, but the guys throughout Japan, Europe, everywhere.

“As I said, it’s inevitable when it comes to something like this and better [to have it] now than the Buriram race or something.”

Miller went on to set the 17th fastest time (+1.754s) from his 32 laps on the final day.

“I wasn't able to extract what I wanted out of the bike, but it wasn’t the bike’s fault,” he said. “It was just me - I need time on it, the same sort of bike every time I exit.

“We've been really busy swapping parts and chassis and so on. We've really tried to understand the good, bad ugly from each part over these last couple of days.

“So we're at the point now where we've got to start riding the same thing and make it very familiar, work a little bit more on electronics, find some horsepower and we'll be alright.”

Miller's average final day top speed of 327.8km/h was 10km/h slower than Fabio di Giannantonio's factory Ducati.

Miller beat time attack in Sprint simulation

Miller’s lack of familiarity with the V4 was underlined by his opening lap of a Sprint simulation being faster than his previous low-fuel time attacks.

“I was happy enough with it,” Miller said of the long run. “I had two cracks at a time this morning and then went for the sprint sim and went eight-tenths quicker in my Sprint sim than I did on the time attack!

“I was really happy with the bike in the latter stages of the Sprint sim. Especially when the surface temp gets hot and stuff like that, the bike starts moving. It was staying true to itself and doing what it should do.”

Miller was the only Yamaha rider to complete a race simulation, albeit in the morning session vs the afternoon for most rivals.

The Australian finished his ten-lap morning run 13.957s slower than the best afternoon Sprint time by Alex Marquez (Gresini Ducati).

To put that deficit into context, it would have placed Miller ninth in last October’s Sprint race, where Miller finished 14th and +17.601s on the former Inline machine.

Miller later set his best lap of the test in the afternoon session, but was still only 0.010s better than his opening Sprint lap.

With Quartararo already ruled out of the remaining days by a finger injury, Alex Rins was the fastest of the Yamaha riders, in 12th and 1.178s behind Alex Marquez.

Yamaha’s D concession status means they can change engine design as needed to fix any fault, should it not be solved by the end of testing, and can also arrange private tests with their race riders to make up for lost track time.

The final MotoGP pre-season test takes place at Buriram on February 21-22.