Moments after Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. announced last Wednesday that its association with Franco Morbidelli would end at the end of the 2023 academic year, the announcement of the signing of Alex Rins (LCR Honda Castrol) by the Iwata brand became official.
Despite recovery going well for the Spaniard following the two operations carried out after the double tibia and fibula injury suffered during the Tissot Sprint of the 2023 Italian GP, the LCR Honda man is still not in perfect condition to ride in MotoGP™. Despite this, the Spaniard did not want to miss the round that marks the beginning of the second half of the 2023 campaign, where he keeps great memories.
Alex Rins took the opportunity to make some first statements on his latest movement and to offer an update on his physical condition: "I am getting better every day, what hurts me the least is the injury itself, the double fracture of the tibia and fibula does not bother me much. Today is 6 weeks after the operation and it is the first day that they let me rest my foot. What hurts the most, what doesn't let me sleep… is the sole of my foot. I guess it's from the injury and a lot of contact… I have hypersensitivity from the tips of my toes to where the heel begins and intense cramps in the soles, but it's getting better".
"I suffered much more pain the first 24 hours after the second operation than in the actual crash itself. They gave me an epidural, and 4 hours after going up from the operating room, my bad leg woke up and the good one was still asleep. I cried from the pain, I've never felt pain so sharp pain and it was all coming from the cramps. It was terrible pain."
"In the end, if it's a clean tear, it's much faster, but everything turned out great anyway. The Madrid team has done an incredible job, they were afraid that since the tear was so low, near the ankle, they could lose mobility, but luckily it went well."
Regarding his return to competition, Rins admits that he still does not have an approximate date: "I would go back now if I could, I'm missing an important event which is Silverstone, one of the circuits that I like and enjoy the most. I don't know when I will be able to return, it is very difficult. Today I have started bearing weight and as the days go by we will see how it progresses. It's a complicated injury, there were many hours in the operating room because it was as if the bone had exploded, so the recovery is slow. I'll be back when they let me."
Despite being out of action, there's been a lot of talk in the paddock surrounding the Spaniard's name following the sudden announcement of his 2024 contract signing with the Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP™ team.
"After so many bad days, the announcement to sign for Yamaha has been incredible. I am very happy. After Suzuki left, we were lost, we knocked on all the doors and one of the doors we knocked on was Yamaha and they told us that that moment couldn't be, they already had Morbidelli and Quartararo. So in the end we went to Honda, and this year seeing how everything has gone, in the position we were in... we asked again to see if we'd have any luck, and we did."
"What has weighed the most is what has been seen race by race. In the end, Honda, HRC have preferred to give the factory team the new parts to test even though I am also a competitive rider... well, I would have liked them to have given me a little bit more support.""The Honda is not a bad bike, I think that the other brands, especially European ones, have taken two steps forward and Honda only a small one. To get the victory in Austin we rode super-fast. We still need to improve, yes, but it's not so far away".