Category: Crew On Two

Cloudless skies meant high temperatures on the Rimini Riviera, and for the MotoGP riders that meant grip at the Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli was at a premium as they qualified for the thirteenth round of the 2019 World Championship.

Q1 saw four or five riders all battling for the top two positions to advance to Q2, but in the end it was Johann Zarco (Red Bull KTM Factory Racing) who topped the session from Joan Mir (Team Suzuki Ecstar), the pair moving through to the pole position shootout.

The Q2 session was very tight, with four riders fighting for pole position: Maverick Vinales (Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP), Fabio Quartararo (Petronas Yamaha SRT), Franco Morbidelli (Petronas Yamaha SRT) and Marc Marquez (Repsol Honda Team). The Yamaha riders had been dominating the weekend, but Marquez had been fast, and remained in touch throughout free practice, although the Honda was proving difficult to manage – especially in the high speed right-handers in sector three.

Marquez was keen to ensure that no one was in his tow, as was Quartararo on his second run. Vinales and Marquez both did three runs, although Marquez’ middle run did not see a flying lap, as he boxed before he started one. This meant both riders were out of sync with most of the rest of the field. Vinales managed to find himself some free space in the final lap, whilst Quartararo was trying to shake Pol Espargaro (Red Bull KTM Factory Racing) and Marquez was behind Valentino Rossi (Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP).

After slowing on the first flying lap of his final run to try to escape the attentions of Pol Espargaro, Quartararo ran wide on the exit of turn eleven, and lost his lap as a result. Espargaro had remained in the Frenchman’s slipstream, though, and put the KTM on provisional pole position.

At the same time, Vinales in free air and Marquez behind Rossi were both on fast laps that would have displaced Espargaro. Vinales was able to finish his lap cleanly, and took provisional pole from Espargaro by almost three tenths with a stunning lap, making the most of the Yamaha’s strong front end and comfort in the middle of the corner in the second half of the lap.

Things proved more complicated for Marquez, who caught an off-the-pace Rossi early in the lap. The speed of the Honda put Marquez in the position to pass Rossi into turn eleven, but the Spaniard ran off the track and onto the green. The move from the #93 did not impress Rossi, who block-passed the World Championship leader in turn fourteen. There was no contact, but the temperature of their rivalry increased once more, and tomorrow could provide some interesting exchanges between the two.

With both Rossi and Marquez ruining each other’s final lap – although Rossi’s wasn’t especially fast in any case – meant pole position was handed to Vinales, his second in Misano in the last three years. The #12’s race pace looks strong, but he will need to start well, as dropping behind the powerful KTM of Espargaro could leave him vulnerable to those behind.

KTM’s best qualifying performance in their MotoGP history was nearly pole position, but nonetheless a second place in a dry qualifying was an impressive performance from Pol Espargaro, especially on a track where Yamaha have been so dominant this weekend.

Fabio Quartararo perhaps should have had pole position, but he was too concerned with those around him. It was a mistake from the Frenchman to not focus on himself, but not one that he is alone in making – even in this session most of the riders were cruising at some point to find themselves some track position. The qualifying was not a disaster, anyway, for the #20, as he will still line up on the front row, and on the inside for turn one which means he can avoid the pinch in turn two.

Franco Morbidelli was close to the front row but didn’t quite have the pace in the second half of the lap compared to his Yamaha stablemates. Fourth place for Morbidelli, though, gives him a good chance tomorrow.

It is rare to see Marc Marquez off the front row, but for just the second time this season it is what we will see tomorrow. His pace is theoretically enough to go with the Yamaha riders, but the effort he has to put in to achieve that is significantly more, it seems. There could be some interesting fights between him and Rossi, all of a stone’s throw from Tavullia, but it is likely that the pair won’t meet each other on track, and that it is the other M1 pilots who Marquez has to worry himself with.

A sixth place start for Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team) was a surprise, but it was achieved on his final lap of Q2. All Ducati riders have struggled this weekend, so for Dovizioso to salvage a second row start is something he will be disappointingly pleased with.

Missing out on the second row may well have cost Valentino Rossi a shot at the podium, and with a KTM and a Ducati in front of him there could be yet another frustrating afternoon in a home GP for The Doctor. A weekend that started out quite promisingly seems to be falling away from the Italian, who will start alongside Alex Rins (Team Suzuki Ecstar) who should be expected to make progress from ninth and Joan Mir (Team Suzuki Ecstar) on his return to racing.

Takaaki Nakagami (LCR Honda IDEMITSU) will start tenth ahead of Johann Zarco, who qualified eighth but will start eleventh thanks to his grid penalty from Silverstone, and wildcard rider Michele Pirro (Ducati Team) who, aside from Dovizioso, has been the only Ducati with any real promise this weekend.

The fastest rider to miss out on Q2 was Francesco Bagnaia (Pramac Racing), although he was close with his penultimate lap to moving through to the second session. The Italian will start his home race from thirteenth ahead of a struggling Cal Crutchlow (LCR Honda CASTROL) and a frustrated Aleix Espargaro (Aprilia Racing Team Gresini) who join the reigning Moto2 World Champion on the fifth row.

Row five sees Jack Miller (Pramac Racing) line up ahead of Danilo Petrucci (Ducati Team). The Ducati stablemates line up sixteenth and seventeenth respectively, ahead of the still-injured Jorge Lorenzo (Repsol Honda Team) on row six, which highlights Ducati’s struggles in Misano this weekend, despite winning the San Marinese round last year.

On row seven, the Red Bull KTM Tech 3 duo of Miguel Oliveira and Hafizh Syahrin qualified ahead of Karel Abraham (Reale Avintia Racing); Tito Rabat (Reale Avintia Racing) was the slowest rider in Q1 despite a strong weekend for the Spaniard, and will start twenty-second, ahead of only Andrea Iannone (Aprilia Racing Team Gresini) who had to go to the medical centre after a FP4 crash and missed Q1 as a result.

Featured Image courtesy of Yamaha Motor Racing Srl

This weekend the MotoGP World Championship heads to the Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli for round twelve of the 2019 season.

Marc Marquez (Repsol Honda Team) arrives in Italy for the second time this year with the championship lead, one which grew dramatically in Britain at the last race courtesy of Fabio Quartararo’s (Petronas Yamaha SRT) crash which took Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team) down as well. Marquez’ points lead now sits at seventy-eight over Dovizioso and, although Misano is not a circuit that has traditionally been a particularly strong one for Marquez in the premier class – only two wins, both in the sketchy conditions of 2015 and 2017 – it is difficult to see a sizeable shift in the championship momentum this weekend.

It was indeed Dovizioso who won last year in Misano, nearly three seconds ahead of Marquez who inherited second after Jorge Lorenzo crashed to begin the downward spiral that has been his last twelve months. Last year’s performance from Dovizioso was somewhat crushing, pulling away with superior tyre management and pace compared to his rivals. In the test two weeks ago, though, Dovizioso complained of a poor feeling with the Desmosedici and, although the grip in Misano is famously inconsistent and unpredictable, that could put the #04 further on the back foot for this weekend.

Misano is an interesting track, since, although it is not necessarily a favourite for any of the riders, it has a reasonable amount of variety, with the direction changes and slow, short-radius corners being contrasted by those three fast right-handers in the third sector. There are no excessively long corners, none in which the rider spends a lot of time on the side of the tyre, but despite this there is a strong history for Yamaha in Misano, perhaps due to the M1’s comfort and ease with which a MotoGP rider can find lap time out of it, which in a small circuit like Misano can be useful – when corners are coming up every other second, it can be positive to have a bike which is easy to control.

Similarly, it can be good to have a bike which turns well, and the Yamaha, Suzuki and Honda – at least in the hands of Marquez – all do this. The Yamaha and Suzuki are comfortable on the edge of the tyre, as is Marquez on the Honda, but what Marquez can do better than anyone else is spin the bike around, pivot almost around the front tyre using the rear tyre to steer, and with Misano’s short corners, this technique can be especially valuable. This seems to rule out Ducati, but thanks to the numerous hard accelerations in Misano, and accompanying hard braking zones, the Desmosedici comes back into the picture with its strong braking stability and torque. Perhaps the Desmosecidi represents the perfect compromise for the MWC, since it is relatively easy to ride, certainly more so than the RC213V, but has the torque, power, aerodynamics and braking stability to mean it can maintain a strong pace throughout a race distance and also be incredibly tough to pass successfully, as Marquez discovered last year in his battle with now-teammate at Repsol Honda Jorge Lorenzo.

As previously mentioned, the grip in Misano is unpredictable, due to a variety of factors that no one can quite agree upon. The constant, though, is that the grip in Misano is always quite low. This plays against the Suzuki and Yamaha riders, since they need grip to use their corner speed advantage. All four Yamaha riders were inside the top five in the test two weeks ago, with Quartararo on top from Petronas Yamaha SRT teammate Franco Morbidelli; whilst the two factory Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP riders, Maverick Vinales and Valentino Rossi, were fourth and fifth respectively behind Marquez in third. Additionally, Joan Mir (Team Suzuki Ecstar) was ninth on the combined times on his return to MotoGP action, whilst Alex Rins (Team Suzuki Ecstar) was fifteenth, albeit only one second off the pace. Although Vinales’ tones after the test were quite negative, all six inline-four bikes looked quite competitive in the test, but we will only find out whether that will translate to the race weekend on Friday, when we can judge the grip levels.

Jorge Lorenzo missed almost all of the Misano test, as the Silverstone race had taken too much from his physical condition. The Spaniard is racing though this weekend, and will be looking once more to find his first top ten since his Austrian GP win last year.

Miguel Oliveira (Red Bull KTM Tech 3) is not a guaranteed starter this weekend, as the Portuguese rider suffered some shoulder problems after Johann Zarco collided with him in Silverstone. The #88, like Lorenzo, did very little at the test, Oliveira’s ability to race being a doubt heading into the San Marinese GP weekend.

Featured image courtesy of Jaime Olivares/Box Repsol

The twelfth round of the 2019 MotoGP World Championship took place in a strangely warm Silverstone, as Alex Rins (Team Suzuki Ecstar) took a dramatic victory.

Marc Marquez (Repsol Honda Team) took the holeshot from his 60th MotoGP pole position in his 120th premier class start. Valentino Rossi (Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP) and Alex Rins were behind the championship leader.

Rins lost the rear of his GSX-RR on the exit of the first corner, and Fabio Quartararo (Petronas Yamaha SRT) rolled the throttle in reaction. The Frenchman’s response caused him to lose the rear of his YZR-M1, and it flicked him. It was unfortunate for the #20, who had been fast all weekend and looked to be a guaranteed factor in the podium fight. However, instead of a trophy, Quartararo left Silverstone with a concussion.

Things were slightly worse for Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team), who was right behind Quartararo when he went down. The Italian had nowhere to go, so hit the Petronas Yamaha and went down, his Desmosedici GP20 bursting into flames as it hurtled towards the barriers. Dovizioso himself had to be carried away on a stretcher which, somehow, was able to be done by the marshals before the rest of the pack completed the first lap, and thus there was no need for a red flag. Dovizioso was carried behind the barriers, where he was able to stand up. The #04 displayed signs of memory loss, and so had to be taken to hospital, where it was confirmed that he had no significant injury.

Back to the British GP and Marquez was leading from Rossi, who was coming under pressure from Rins. That did not last long, though, as the Spaniard passed Rossi for third into turn eight on lap two with an impressive out-braking manoeuvre, taking yards out of Rossi into the Vale chicane. It was here that Rossi’s prospective struggles became apparent, immediately dropping off the back of Rins, out of the lead fight, and further into the clutches of fourth-placed teammate Maverick Vinales (Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP).

Vinales was eventually able to pass Rossi on lap seven in turn seven. But by this point he was over two seconds back of his two leading compatriots and with a lot of work to do. The bigger problem for Vinales’ victory hopes than his gap to the front was his lack of superior pace to the leading pair, who were able to keep the gap to him relatively stable throughout the majority of the remaining thirteen laps.

That meant it was a duel between Marquez and Rins. As in Austria, Marquez led for the majority of the race, showing Rins the way, showing Rins his rear tyre; where he was strong, where he was weak. Marquez knew this, and around the mid-point of the race slowed to allow Rins through. The #42, though, saw Marquez’ tactics, and the threat they posed, so allowed the #93 back through six corners after he took the lead. Rins was entirely uninterested in showing Marquez anything, knowing that the seven-times World Champion is always capable of finding more time than you expect, especially with a target to aim at.

Rins followed Marquez from lap two until the penultimate lap, when he made a move at Aintree, which was a surprise. The Suzuki rider had been especially strong on corner entry, in the last part of the braking, so to pass in a corner with no braking zone was strange. But Marquez fought straight back, reclaiming the lead into the next corner at Brooklands.

At this point, Rins saw he had one chance left. This was strange for a penultimate lap, but Rins thought it was the final lap; he tried to ride round the outside of Marquez in Woodcote. Whilst Rins led, officially, onto the final lap, Marquez had – rightly – forced him out onto the run-off area on the outside of Woodcote. Unlike in 2014, at Brno, when Rins thought the penultimate lap was the final lap, the Spaniard did not completely roll out of the throttle on this occasion, and was able to re-engage before the first corner of the final lap. But he was never able to get close enough to make a move on the brakes.

Marquez defended very well, taking excessively tight lines and blocking the path of the flowing Suzuki, meaning Rins was not able to try to pass before the final section. He knew he had to try to out-drive Marquez and the Honda through the final corner, and when Marquez had a slide in the middle of it, he sensed his opportunity, cut to the inside and took the victory on the line by 0.013 seconds, the second MotoGP win of his career in another battle with one of the greatest of the sport’s history.

Second place for Marquez represented another final corner defeat to a rider with superior rear grip on the right side of the tyre. It also represented a twenty-point increase in his championship advantage thanks to Dovizioso’s retirement from the race, an advantage which now sits at 78 points, and an extension of his top two finishing record which stretches back to Austria 2018.

Maverick Vinales’ third place was a welcome return to the podium for the Spaniard having missed it since the summer break. The #12 was close to his compatriots at the end courtesy of them fighting in the penultimate lap and Marquez’ protective lines. In reality Vinales’ only shot at victory was an overly ambitious move from one of the front two. Perhaps to be only in a somewhat detached third place was disappointing for Yamaha, having looked like they could be with three bikes on the podium through the weekend.

Fourth place for Valentino Rossi was determined from the start, where he missed performance from the rear tyre and was unable to match the speed of the Spanish trio who finished ahead of him. Cal Crutchlow (LCR Honda CASTROL) and Jack Miller (Pramac Racing) were eight seconds back of Rossi and split by Danilo Petrucci (Ducati Team), the ex-teammates also suffering with rear tyre problems in the race which saw them lapping over one second slower than they had in practice.

Between Rossi in fourth and Crutchlow in sixth was Franco Morbidelli (Petronas Yamaha SRT) who equalled his best finish of the season with fifth, completing a strong weekend in a good way, albeit thirteen seconds adrift of the win.

Behind Miller in eighth were Pol Espargaro (Red Bull KTM Factory Racing) and Andrea Iannone (Aprilia Racing Team Gresini) who completed the top ten, good results for both factories.

Francesco Bagnaia (Pramac Racing) saw his race weekend go sour in qualifying, where he lost grip. The Italian was unable to rediscover the grip lost on Saturday afternoon and ended up fifteen seconds adrift of the top ten in eleventh place, five seconds ahead of Joan Mir’s replacement at Team Suzuki Ecstar, Sylvain Guintoli. Hafizh Syahrin (Red Bull KTM Tech 3) was thirteenth ahead of the returning Jorge Lorenzo (Repsol Honda Team) and Karel Abaham (Reale Avintia Racing) who completed.

Tito Rabat (Reale Avintia Racing) suffered a crash, but got back on to finish sixteenth ahead of fellow crasher Takaaki Nakagami (LCR Honda IDEMITSU) who also got back on for seventeenth, and was the final classified rider.

After Quartararo and Dovizioso were out on the first lap, Johann Zarco (Red Bull KTM Factory Racing) and Miguel Oliveira (Red Bull KTM Tech 3) collided on lap nine, for which Zarco received a three-place grid penalty for the next round in Misano. The final retirement was Aleix Espargaro (Aprilia Racing Team Gresini) on the last lap.

This weekend the 2019 MotoGP World Championship crosses the English Channel and heads to Silverstone for the British Grand Prix – round twelve of the season.

For the first time since he took the championship lead in Jerez, Marc Marquez’ (Repsol Honda Team) points advantage was trimmed in the last round, as Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team) defeated him in another one of the pair’s classic last-lap duels. Whilst Dovizioso knows he needs a dose of bad luck on the side of Marquez for him to challenge the Spaniard for this year’s title (the gap is fifty-eight points with eight rounds to go) he arrives in Silverstone with his confidence re-discovered after some negative races in Italy, Catalunya, the Netherlands, Germany and the Czech Republic. Austria was an important moment for Dovizioso, because he reminded himself that he can beat Marquez in the right circumstances – he just needs those circumstances to be more frequently occurring.

Both Dovizioso and Marquez have one premier class win in Silverstone, Marquez’ coming in 2014 in a classic duel with Jorge Lorenzo – round two of their ‘Battle of Britain’ – and Dovizioso’s arriving in 2017, when he beat both factory Yamaha riders and benefited from a rare expiration on the #93 Honda.

In the past, Silverstone’s uneven surface has disturbed the Honda almost uncontrollably, the RC213V’s aggressive and unstable nature not suiting the bumpy British asphalt. However, this year the bumps are reportedly gone after the circuit was resurfaced earlier in the year. The Formula One race was the first to take place on the new asphalt, and the reports were generally good. The one negative place was the entry to Brooklands, although this area was known to the circuit beforehand and has been rectified since. Of course, the main reason for the second resurfacing in just over one calendar year was the non-existent drainage on the previous surface which caused the cancellation of last year’s British MotoGP. It seems this, too, has been rectified with the new surface.

A smoother asphalt should suit Marquez and his Honda, with the Spaniard able to explore the areas beyond the limits of the 2019 RC213V with less risk than in the past, where a hole could tear the bike from his grasp whilst over the aforementioned limit.

This is worrying for his opposition, although for several of Marquez’ rivals the smoother surface for this year could in fact be even more beneficial.

Suzuki and Yamaha live on the edge of the tyre, especially Yamaha. Their (relatively) easy-to-use frames meant they were more comfortable than other bikes over the bumps, but the removal of those means they can greater exploit their mid-corner speed advantage which, at a circuit as fast as Silverstone which has many long corners, can potentially be a greater advantage than the one they perhaps held previously on the older surfaces.

Alex Rins (Team Suzuki Ecstar) also has one win in Silverstone, coming in 2014 in the Moto3 class. He also finished second in 2013 to Luis Salom and second in the 2015 Moto2 race to Johann Zarco. In 2017, Rins finished ninth in the MotoGP, an impressive top ten from what was a rookie enduring a tough season blighted by injury. Last year the weekend was more complicated for the #42, however, finishing eighteenth in the combined free practice times. Still without a podium since Jerez, Rins will be hoping to return to the box this weekend, and continue to close the gap on Danilo Petrucci (Ducati Team) in the battle for third in the championship.

Both Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP riders, Maverick Vinales and Valentino Rossi, will also be hoping to make the best of the new surface, with the pair hoping the new grip offered by the juvenile asphalt will work well for their M1s.

For Rossi, a podium this weekend would be his fifth in Silverstone and, discounting last year’s cancellation, his fifth in succession. When the British GP was held in Donington Park, Rossi won seven times, but its transfer to Silverstone in 2010 presented problems for Rossi, who always felt behind the eight-ball when arriving in Northamptonshire due to missing the 2010 GP through injury and spending the next two years on the Desmosedici. However, with four podiums in the last four British GPs it is perhaps fair to say that the Italian should be in with a decent shot of the top three this weekend.

Whilst Rossi’s recent history in Silverstone is good, Vinales’ is – below the surface – quite particularly good. A dominant win in 2016 on the Suzuki showed Vinales’ potential around the British track and, in the following two years with Yamaha, he showed a strong pace. He finished second to Dovizioso in 2017, beaten by the Ducati’s power, and last year his pace pointed towards a podium challenge for what was then the #25 M1. The Spaniard was unable to pass his teammate two weeks ago in Austria, and before that in the Czech Republic a difficult start off the wet half of the grid caused him difficulties. However, with the short run to the first corner in Silverstone, a good qualifying and an okay start could see the #12 M1 in the fight.

Outside of the factory Yamaha team, Petronas Yamaha SRT’s Fabio Quartararo will surely be in the fight, too. The Frenchman has never stood on the podium in Britain, but showed strongly last year in free practice for the Moto2 class. Regardless of previous form in Silverstone, Quartararo arrives in Britain this year having the time of his life, riding better than he ever has and is off the back of an unlikely podium in Austria which took his podium tally for 2019 above that of Rossi. Although he misses speed, there is a chance this weekend for Quartararo to take his first MotoGP win.

At Suzuki, this weekend there will be no Joan Mir, who is replaced at Team Suzuki Ecstar by test rider Sylvain Guintoli as the Spaniard continues to recover from injuries sustained in his Brno testing crash.

Elsewhere, Jorge Lorenzo is back in the Repsol Honda Team, and is another rider who could benefit strongly from the smooth surface, although his fitness is of course questionable after nearly two months off the bike and now almost one year of being constantly injured. Lorenzo is of course without a top ten in over one year, so breaking that particular duck will be probably fairly high on the #99’s list.