Joan Mir and Luca Marini head state side for another weekend of hard work and development as Honda HRC Castrol aim to continue their vigorous start to the year.
The global voyage of the MotoGP World Championship continues as Honda HRC Castrol return to North America after a brief respite for Round Three of the 2025 season at the distinctive Circuits of The Americas in Austin, Texas. Perhaps the most unique track on the calendar, COTA’s 20 corners and 5.51 kilometres of tarmac offer a huge variety with the sequence from Turn 3 to Turn 6 a particularly unique challenge. A track such as this offers another great testing ground for the ever-improving Honda RC213V which has so far made steady progress in Thailand and Argentina.
11th in the World Championship standings, Joan Mir returned to the top ten in a Grand Prix last time out as he put a run of falls behind him. With a second strong weekend in his pocket, the double World Champion’s confidence continues to improve, and his focus remains on finding improvements in a few key areas. Mir’s best finish in Austin is fourth in the premier class, achieved in 2022.
Luca Marini arrives in Austin looking to take another step after a progressive start to his 2025 campaign. Able to take points in both Grands Prix this year and showing great pace on Sundays, a better grid position should prime the Italian to join his Honda HRC Castrol teammate further up the field. America holds fond memories for Marini, the Italian scoring his first premier class podium there in 2023.
Joan Mir
“A quick time between races but I am eager to get going again and keep building our potential. Austin is a really unique circuit, completely different from almost anywhere else we ride. Of course, we are approaching with optimism after what we have to say is a quite good start to the year, but we need to see how our bike goes there, what the track is like, many things. It’s a track all about flowing, putting everything together in one lap because a small mistake can be difficult to recover from with the layout of the circuit.”
Luca Marini
“I am looking for more in Austin, we have been happy with how the first two races have gone but now it’s time to take a step. If we can have a better performance when qualifying, we can be much closer to everyone. In Argentina I was happy with my pace in the race and able to close a lot of distance to the leaders, but like this you arrive at a point where you can’t do more when you are catching up and using the tyre. Starting higher will help us to be more competitive. COTA is a track I like a lot, so I want to make the most of this weekend.”
