Yamaha endured a difficult outing at the 2026 MotoGP Buriram Test, as they were unable to register an improvement over their lap times from the 2025 test at the same circuit.
Over two days of pre-season running at the Chang International Circuit, Yamaha’s fastest laps fell slightly short of last year’s benchmarks, prompting renewed scrutiny over the team’s development trajectory ahead of the new campaign.
Despite ongoing setup revisions and continued refinement of the YZR-M1 package, Yamaha riders struggled to deliver a meaningful step forward in outright pace.
Jack Miller, riding for Prima Pramac Yamaha, set the Japanese manufacturer’s fastest time at 1:29.672.
However, the lap was slower than Yamaha’s best effort in 2025 by 0.086s and, more significantly, slightly over one second adrift of Aprilia, after Marco Bezzecchi established a new lap record of 1:28.668.
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Former world champion Fabio Quartararo clocked a best lap of 1:29.701, which was 0.115s slower than his personal benchmark from last year.
Alex Rins (1:30.122) and newcomer Toprak Razgatlioglu (1:30.772) also found gains difficult to extract, as they were the only full-time riders unable to break into the 1:29 mark.
In contrast to Yamaha’s performance, rival manufacturers recorded measurable improvements compared to their 2025 Buriram Test benchmarks.
Aprilia made the most significant step forward, improving by 0.392s, followed by KTM (0.112s) and Honda (0.103s).
Ducati, already operating near the front, still managed a marginal improvement of 0.019s.
Yamaha’s failure to unlock a clear improvement in peak performance will be a concern heading into the season-opening Thailand Grand Prix.
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