Category: MotoGp

Sunday in Silverstone was something of an unprecedented situation for MotoGP, at least since the word “MotoGP” became a reality. Not since Misano 1990 had every single rider in every single class walked away with precisely the same points with which they entered the weekend; and not since Austria 1980 had every World Championship race been cancelled in a motorcycle Grand Prix weekend. That weekend was due to snow. In fact, this weekend we saw the first cancelled races since Indianapolis 2008, when the 250 GP was cancelled because of a hurricane.

The situation in Silverstone was similar in at least one way to all of these events. Indianapolis 2008 was cancelled because of impending rain, and the races in Silverstone were rescheduled in an attempt to avoid the worst of the day’s precipitation. In addition Austria ’80 saw all races cancelled, and Misano 1990 was cancelled due to rain. But none of these perhaps had the controversy behind them as this weekend’s British Grand Prix did (well, maybe Misano ’90, but in a different way). All of the previous situations were brought about purely because weather conditions prevented racing: you can’t race in the snow, you can’t race in a hurricane and you can’t race in monsoon-like rain, but Silverstone 2018 was such a disaster because of the track surface.

So, what made Silverstone such a disaster this year? Well, the problem was identified in July, at Formula One’s British Grand Prix. Atypically, it was not F1’s fault, maybe they made it worse, but not significantly – the problem was already there. After the first practice of the F1 weekend back in July, drivers were almost unanimous in opining that the new Silverstone circuit was more bumpy than before, Lewis Hamilton even spoke to Cal Crutchlow about the situation, saying that Silverstone was “the bumpiest he had ever driven”. This sparked worry for MotoGP.

The circuit had resurfaced its entire 3.6 mile track over the winter with the precise goals of improving grip consistency (previously there had been four different surfaces around the track) and erasing bumps. The second point there was of most immediate concern for the riders; Silverstone was not in a state akin to Barcelona or Jerez in terms of grip, but the bumps made riding there quite dangerous, because bumps make everything very unpredictable and difficult to manage, and when in a group it can be hard to pick out where the bumps are, which makes it easy to crash. You can say “the riders should be able to ride through them, they are the best in the world,” but if you cannot see where the danger is, how are you supposed to avoid it? That is the danger of bumps, and in Silverstone they were particularly bad.

The new surface aimed to rectify that, and as far as Franco Uncini (the MotoGP Safety Officer – he homologates the circuits) was concerned, in February it was fine, and it was in March, too. Cal Crutchlow concurred with the 1982 500cc World Champion when he rode a Honda RC213V-S there for a media day, with the opinion that the surface was generally fine, bar a couple of spots that were more bumpy. Uncini had made the same deductions before Crutchlow, which as encouraging because there was agreement. The circuit was not 100% perfect, but it was damn close.

Then, however, something happened. Between March and July, when the F1 race was held, because when the car racers showed up, they came out with comments like Hamilton’s to Crutchlow. Something in that time period happened to make the track more bumpy, more so even than it was before the new surface was laid. There are some possibilities, like the unusually hot summer Britain has enjoyed, but realistically it is difficult to know precisely what made the track deteriorate so much with so little top-level track action.
These bumps became a problem from the beginning of the weekend – even in the dry. Valentino Rossi said that you have to “not care” to negotiate the bumps, whereas Andrea Dovizioso opined that riding around the bumps was the best way. Ultimately, the bike determined the strategy – the Yamaha could handle the bumps well, whereas the likes of the Honda and Ducati couldn’t deal with them so efficiently – especially the Honda.

But that didn’t matter come Saturday afternoon and FP4. When the rain came down at the end of the session, it became a disaster between turn seven, Stowe, and turn ten, Club. In these areas, especially in turns seven and eight – particularly the braking areas for these corners – it was impossible to ride. The problem was that the water was pooling in the bumps, so aquaplaning became both inevitable and extreme. In turn seven at least seven riders ran off track or crashed in the space of one minute or so. Alex Rins was first in, and then tried to direct traffic from the gravel trap to minimise risk for the other riders. Jorge Lorenzo, Aleix Espargaro and Marc Marquez all also ran on, and Tito Rabat crashed. Franco Morbidelli also fell a few seconds after Tito, and when the Spaniard stood up, he was hit by Morbidelli’s 160kg bike, travelling at 100+mph. The result was a broken fibula, tibia and femur for the 2014 Moto2 World Champion. Thankfully, he had a successful operation on Saturday night and on Sunday took his first steps since the accident.

The accident for Tito was a direct result of the weather, as neither he, nor any of the other riders who went into the gravel at turn seven in that period, was able to stop the bike. Bradley Smith said he started braking “500 metres before the corner” and still couldn’t stop the bike, because it just aquaplaned. When the bike aquaplanes, the tyre is not touching the asphalt, of course, so you cannot slow down. Rins said that the water in that section was deep enough to submerge a whole finger. You can have the best tyres in the world, but if you have 10cm of water, it is impossible to control.

Following this, and considering the incoming day-long deluge facing the whole of the UK for Sunday, Race Direction decided, together with the teams and the riders, that rescheduling the races was the best plan for Sunday. MotoGP was moved to 11:30 am, and Moto3 and 2 would follow the premier class race.
This didn’t work. Already in Moto3 warm up on Sunday morning, the rain had arrived, and by the end of the Moto2 warm up, the track had become shiny, as the standing water was starting to gather.

11:30 arrived, and things were terrible. Alvaro Bautista ran into the gravel at turn eight because he was trying to warm his carbon brakes, and it just locked. Then, Maverick Vinales was seen coming out of pit lane, spinning the rear tyre immediately. Alex Rins reckoned that he was spinning the tyre with 15% throttle in third gear on his way to the grid for the initial start time. They were on the limit just for the sighting lap, and so it was no surprise that the start was delayed – just to ride a MotoGP bike in those conditions would have been nearly impossible, let alone race one.

From there, there were many inspections, and many meetings, before at 4pm the Safety Commission decided that the races should be cancelled, because the track would not be in a good enough order to race whilst there was still enough light to race.

There had been the option to race earlier that was presented to the teams, but they needed warm up (these are 270+hp motorcycles, you need to prepare) and they, as well as the circuit, needed time to prepare the track after the warm up. There are procedures which need to be done for safety in a race meeting, and as a result it was not possible to run any earlier than 11:30.

Then there was the possibility to race on Monday – after all, it’s August bank holiday, everyone is free, right? Wrong. MotoGP relies on a vast number of temporary services, such as security guards, and temporary, rented equipment, such as generators, that have been rented for Thursday through Sunday, not through Monday. On top of that, the people who work in the paddock who pay to get there would have to cancel and re-book flights should they be necessary, which is potentially beyond their realistic means – this includes freelance journalists, photographers and such like. Additionally, and arguably more importantly, the teams cannot afford to stay one more day, especially the private teams who are tight on budget as it is, and furthermore the TV companies do not have the time slots available to them to be able to air races on Monday. It happened in Qatar in 2009, but it happened in Qatar in 2009 because the Losail International Circuit could afford to make it happen, Silverstone couldn’t.

But how did we arrive in this situation in the first place. It has already been explained that the track was resurfaced over the winter, and that it initially was good, and later became not-so-good with the bumps. But the bumps were just one part of the problem.

With a new surface there is one guarantee: for the first year or two, the porousness of the surface will be poor. Think Sepang’s new surface, which takes basically half a day to dry out from just a small shower. It happened to F1 in Korea back in 2010 – the surface had been down for a matter of weeks, so a downpour before the race halted proceedings by an hour and more. The issue was more extreme, though, this weekend in Silverstone, because instead of having poor porousness, it had none. A light shower would be okay, as we saw in Moto2 FP2, that was manageable for the riders; but a deluge like we saw on Saturday, or the prolonged downpour of Sunday was too much for the track to drain, and even drainage ditches and cuts in the track could not help the situation. After so long, the water just started to build up, until you basically ended up with something resembling a lake – and this was after two hours.

The day-long drenching the new Silverstone surface took today was well beyond its drainage capabilities, and mixed with the pooling in the bumps, as well as the polished parts of the track (from cars bottoming out at the end of straights when under maximum loading, causing the abrasiveness of the stones in the asphalt to disappear) it became an impossible situation for the riders, and an equally hard one to call for the Race Direction.

It is at this point that it is important to point out that in 2011 there was an almost identical situation, with rain all day, and all three races went ahead, and just last year in BSB there was a race in biblical conditions, but everyone went out, it was deemed safe enough to ride, although there were only seven finishers. Today was normal rain, nothing spectacular, just normal rain, over a long period of time, which is common in Britain, and it was deemed unsafe.

So, was it Race Direction’s bad decision, did they listen too much to the riders? Well, no. Firstly, it is my opinion that the decision to continue the race last year in British Superbike when so many riders were crashing was a bad one, because it was clearly unsafe (although in the same moment, BSB goes to tracks like Cadwell Park and Oulton Park, which are dangerous tracks, so the standard is maybe lower). Secondly, in 2011 the surface could deal with the water, so aquaplaning was less.

The fact that the new surface could not deal with the water on Saturday, or Sunday, shows that the surface was the issue, and therefore two groups of people are at fault. One is Aggregate UK, who provided and laid the surface over the winter; a surface which was produced and designed in the UK, yet could not absorb any water whatsoever. Second, you have to put some blame at the door of Silverstone, because they employed the services of Aggregate UK. Ultimately, Aggregate UK did a terrible job, they laid a surface which has no drainage and is in fact worse than the one they replaced, and Silverstone have a right to feel cheated by them, as do the fans, teams, riders and the Championship.

In a press conference after the decision to cancel the races, Franco Uncini said that there have been demands for a new surface to be laid at Silverstone for next year, and before that there will be an investigation into why exactly the circuit could not absorb any water. How exactly Silverstone manages to afford another full resurfacing job just a few months after the last one remains to be seen, and it remains to be seen if it is even possible. Once the new surface has been laid, there are intentions to test the track in the wet although there have been admissions from Mike Webb (Race Director) that after the experience of artificially wetting the Losail track earlier this year, it is difficult to see how that could happen.

Ultimately, it was a combination poor asphalt being poorly laid, a remarkable British summer which left the track unprepared for the wet (Saturday and Sunday were probably the worst two days this new surface has seen, weather-wise) and a day with no break in the weather which conspired to create this British MotoGP disaster, and at the moment it is unsure how it can move on from this.

One thing, though, is for sure. Silverstone want to continue to host the British Motorcycle Grand Prix, and MotoGP are keen to continue to have a British Grand Prix. Over the next months we should see whether the British Grand Prix will continue in the near future, and whether it will continue at Silverstone.

Featured image courtesy of Yamaha Motor Racing.

The Austrian Grand Prix weekend was a complete disaster for Yamaha, there is no other word. Both on the track and off it, Yamaha’s weekend at the last Grand Prix was nothing short of embarrassing. Hampered by a mechanical in the only dry free practice, FP1, Valentino Rossi failed to make Q2 directly from free practice, and could only manage fourteenth on the grid, complaining that the soft tyre was too soft for the Yamaha. Meanwhile, Maverick Vinales was only eleventh on the grid, suffering with sensor problems. This Saturday slump led the MotoGP project leader, Kouji Tsuya, to apologise to both the manufacturer’s factory riders for the poor performance of the bike, promising improvements are on the way in two upcoming tests.

One of those tests – in Misano – has already been and gone. We will only find out whether there was any progress on Friday, but for the sake of the manufacturer, you would hope that there have been some positive findings.

So, we know the situation, some have described this as “rock bottom” for Yamaha. They sit second in the riders championship with Valentino Rossi, third in the manufacturers’ standings, 53 points from the Honda at the top; and third in the teams’ championship with twelve points between the Movistar team and the Repsol Honda outfit. The numbers don’t seem so bad, and that is because the M1, despite many contrary opinions, has improved in some areas this year, and this has allowed it to be strong in some circuits. However, the neglection of the core issue with the bike means that in the places where the M1 was weak last year, it is weaker this year, because everyone else has moved on. So, whilst the balance of the bike has improved compared to last year, and the M1 is back to being the smooth, high-corner-speed bike we know it as, the electronics have not progressed – or not progressed enough – which in this era of MotoGP is the most critical part.

As Rossi mentioned before Austria, the Red Bull Ring is the M1’s worst circuit, the slow speed corners followed by long straights is the worst combination for it, because it can’t use its corner speed, and its acceleration issues are emphasised. So it is likely that in the coming weekends the M1 will seem in a good way again, but that won’t mean that the issues are solved, just that they are masked by the circuit layout.

But where did this start? We know the situation Yamaha are in at the moment – their worst moment since 1998 – but where did this path start? Why are they in this hole?

It’s possible to trace the root of their issues back to 2015. The M1 was the best bike in 2015, no doubt about it. The bike was the best out of the box in Qatar for the first race, and the developments Yamaha brought to the bike throughout the year almost always worked. But there was one issue, a familiar one: rear tyre wear. Yamaha were able to get around this three years ago because they had the luxury of factory electronics, designed specifically for the M1, and understood perfectly by the engineers in Iwata.

With the introduction of the universal, spec ECU in 2016, though, Yamaha became complacent. They heard “controlled electronics” and took that as gospel, putting less effort than their competitors – notably Honda and Ducati – into developing and understanding the Magneti Marelli software. Whilst their two biggest rivals went out and poached engineers from Marelli themselves, and the likes of Suzuki sent their own engineers to Italy to learn the functions of the controlled software, Yamaha didn’t act, and worked on the new system themselves, with no external assistance.

Instead of focusing on electronics, Yamaha looked at the chassis, the motor and the aerodynamics of the M1. The first item they introduced to combat the tyre wear issues was a new chassis, at the post-race Valencia test at the end of 2015. It didn’t work, neither Jorge Lorenzo nor Valentino Rossi liked the update, which had the fuel tank mounted further back in the bike, with the fuel going into the bike in the tail section, behind the seat. So, the 2016 chassis was essentially the 2015 chassis, with some slightly bigger wings on the front. However, the 2015 chassis was by far the best on the grid in 2015, meaning that in the first half of 2016, the Yamaha was still the best machine out there, and was only missing the championship lead through reliability (Rossi’s blow up in the Mugello race – and Lorenzo’s in warm up the same day – were supposedly due to a mapping problem on the electronics which allowed the bike to over-rev over the crest, with disastrous consequences) and rider error.

From the halfway point of the 2016 season, though, when Honda and Ducati started to see the fruits of their labour with regards to the electronics, Yamaha started to fall back, unable to make the tyre last the distance. The first time it really became apparent was in Aragon, where Rossi led the early stages, but was hunted down by Marquez with ease once the tyres started to drop slightly. This set the tone for the rest of the season, with Yamaha not winning until Valencia of that year, and even then Lorenzo was closed down hand over fist by Marc Marquez in the final laps of the race.

The degradation issues with the rear that the M1 was suffering with in the second half of 2016 prompted Yamaha to go full revolution – in MotoGP terms – with the 2017 bike. Initially, it looked like they had got it right. Rossi was struggling a lot through free practices, but was able to find something for Sunday, whilst Vinales looked almost unbeatable in the first portion of the season – only denied a sweep of the first three races by a crash in Texas, and even that handed Rossi the championship lead. Everything looked good for Yamaha as the championship entered the European season, but it was in Jerez, where Vinales finished sixth and Rossi only tenth, that it started to decline for the Movistar team. Another poor result in Barcelona (Rossi 8th, Vinales 10th) showed the extent of Yamaha’s misdirection, especially as Rossi had won in both Jerez and Barcelona the previous year, and there had been no changes to either circuits.

New chassis’ arrived for the pair to test in the post-race test in Montmelo 2017, supposedly the 2017 chassis with some 2016 bits (stiffness ratios, for example) and Rossi felt that one in particular was an improvement. Supposedly Vinales preferred the original 2017 design, but he was forced into using the one that Rossi had chosen, a decision which haunted Vinales’ mind for the rest of the season.

Rossi won the next race, and it seemed all was well once again, but wet weather nightmares, and poor dry pace regardless, in Sachsenring proved otherwise. Another string of poor results in the second half of 2017, and a terrible weekend in Valencia, sent the team to do what they had been avoiding for half a season, and they switched overnight to the 2016 chassis. No setup time meant that they had no pace in the race, and it was another disastrous result for the factory team, made no better by the fact that Johann Zarco on the Tech 3 Yamaha was fighting for the victory against Dani Pedrosa.

The post-race Valencia test in 2017 saw all manner of different combinations in both the factory Yamaha garage, and the Tech 3 pit, as they tried to find a direction for 2018. Ultimately, they reverted to the 2016 design for their base, but once more over the winter there was a lack of investment in the electronic side, and from the first tests of the 2018 preseason, it was clear that the M1 was still a way off being able to win a race.

Now, though, it is clear that the problem lies not only in the electronic side of the Yamaha, but in other areas too.

A new engine was introduced over the winter, liked by both riders and thus homologated. Furthermore, it is believed  both Honda and Ducati has had continued development over the last months, whilst Yamaha has remained stagnant in this area.

The engine, though, is perhaps the most immediate issue. Fundamentally, Yamaha messed up with the design of this year’s engine, and the crankshaft is too light, meaning the engine is too aggressive. It is the same thing which caused Honda so many problems in 2015 and ’16, and the most critical problem Suzuki faced last year. The biggest problem for Yamaha is that they cannot change the engine until the winter, for now they have to make do with what they have, and what they have is not good enough.

On the organisational side, this could prove just as fatal as any mechanical or electronic issue with the M1. A full overhaul of the management and inner workings of the Iwata manufacturer could produce instability lasting for months and even years, putting them out of contention for titles for as long as that instability lasts. Without stability and progressive evolution inside the team, or the whole Yamaha MotoGP department, it becomes difficult to work correctly and make progress with the bike, because the new people have to fit together in the new system, and that takes time, especially when it is a reactionary move – and in this case, it would be most certainly reactionary on Yamaha’s part. That said, staying as they are resigns them to stagnation; to progress, they have to change the way they work, and just like with the engine, they have no choice.

A third issue appeared after Brno. A Ducati engineer explained that the key to the Michelin tyres is to use the drive grip, the centre of the tyre. They said that one of the reasons Yamaha are struggling at the moment, could be that they spend so much time on the side of the tyre. This is because the style of the Yamaha is to run a lot of corner speed, and to utilise the edge grip of the tyre. The problem is that this increases wheelspin, and thus tyre wear. This is especially worrying for Yamaha, because it means that they could face redesigning the entire motorcycle, completely changing their philosophy to comply with the demands of the Michelin.

Whilst this would be one of a number of things that stand between Yamaha and wining again, personally I hope this is not one that will be fleshed out. One of the biggest appeals of motorcycle racing is the diversity and variety, both in riding styles and design philosophies. If Yamaha were to go away from their traditional ‘corner speed’ bikes for the sake of tyres, it would be a shame, because it would essentially mean that to win, there is only one way, and that is not MotoGP, it is not MotoGP to me, anyway.

Neglecting the latest point, Yamaha still have a lot of work to do before they arrive at a Grand Prix in a state where they can win again. Starting with the engine, of which a 2019 spec should be in their final test day of 2018 in Aragon, after Silverstone, there are many aspects on which the engineers back in Japan have to work upon, and really it is doubtful that they will even be able to win consistently, if at all, next year. However, the (belated) announcement of a Yamaha European test team for next year shows they are on the right track, and are intent on solving their issues in the longer term.

For now, though; I tweeted on the day of the French Grand Prix that “If it (a Yamaha win) won’t happen today then it won’ t happen at all in 2018”, and right now that prediction seems fairly on the money.

Featured Image courtesy Yamaha Motor Racing

“Ducati Land”. That was the tag Marc Marquez labelled the Red Bull Ring on Saturday, despite setting pole position in Q2 by 0.002 seconds over Andrea Dovizioso. There was no debate about his statement, the slow corners, followed by long straights that the Red Bull Ring is comprised of suits the Desmosedici perfectly.

In the same moment, the same characteristics of the Red Bull Ring lend themselves extremely well to Jorge Lorenzo, whose style is all geared to strong corner exit speed.

Whilst there was a miscommunication on Saturday in the #99 side of the Ducati garage, it would be solely down to his only two rivals – Marquez and Ducati teammate Andresa Dovizioso – to defeat the Majorcan over the 28-lap race distance.

But that is not to say that Lorenzo was the clear favourite; both Marquez and Dovizioso had looked at least as strong as the five times World Champion on the previous two days, and Marquez was the only rider in the field to have managed to get a long run in on all tyres.

However, it made it no less surprising to see Marquez escape at the front in the beginning of the race. The reigning World Champion admitted after the race that his strategy was to bolt away at the start, to try to fight only one Ducati, as he had learned from Brno that fighting two factory Desmosedicis at the same time is nearly impossible, such is their strength in both acceleration and braking.

His strategy nearly worked. When Marquez passed Dovi in turn three on the first lap, he ran the Italian out wide, costing him two places. It let Lorenzo through, but Marquez at this stage was more worried about Dovi. Once Marquez had passed Lorenzo for the lead, he started to pull away, and Lorenzo looked to be both struggling and holding up his factory Ducati teammate.

But Dovizioso was unable to pass the number 99, which for a while looked okay, because the gap between Marquez and Lorenzo was decreasing. But in the same moment as Lorenzo passed Marquez for the lead, in turn one on lap nineteen, Dovizioso ran wide, lost one second, and was unable in the remaining ten laps to close the margin.

It was, then, between Lorenzo and Marquez. They swapped positions often, Marquez being very strong into turn three, and Lorenzo more so in turns one, eight and nine.

Eventually, the final lap arrived, with Marquez leading into it, but Lorenzo passing him into turn one. Marquez responded in turn three, but simultaneously lost both the front and the rear, which meant Lorenzo was able to carry the momentum around the outside, and out-drag the number 93 to turn four. The gap now was quite big, and over Lorenzo Marquez did not have the same advantage in the two left handers of turns six and seven that he had over Dovizioso last year. This, combined with Marquez’s mistake in turn three, was the deciding factor, because Marquez could not get close enough into either turn nine or ten to make a pass, and he could not deny Lorenzo victory.

Jorge learned his lesson from last year. In 2017, he went too hard at the start, trying to escape, but he used too much fuel, which meant that he had to run softer engine modes in the later laps, giving him nothing to fight with in the second half of the race. This year, he managed the fuel at the start, as well as the tyre (he went soft-soft), and this allowed him to attack more at the end, at no disadvantage to Marquez. Furthermore, Lorenzo proved once again that the soft, when managed correctly, can last better than a medium or a hard rear tyre, simply because it spins less, and so there is less excessive temperature build up in the tyre.

Perhaps, though, the most impressive thing about Lorenzo’s ride, was his aggression in the battle against Marquez. There were some tough moves going down in this battle, it was a proper scrap, one that you might expect Lorenzo to lose out in, in the past, but on this occasion, just like in Brno a week previous, Jorge had enough and more to be able to put up a fight against the best scrapper in the world, and he turned the Red Bull Ring from “Ducati Land” to “Lorenzo’s Land”. Again, we ask “what if?” What if Jorge Lorenzo had started the season in the form he has had since Mugello. What if Ducati had listened to him, and given him the fuel tank modifications sooner? What if Ducati re-signed him? Jorge Lorenzo has the potential to fight for this world title, but unfortunately all the work he has put in this year to work out the Ducati will be for nothing when he jumps on the Honda RC213V at Valencia in November, and starts all over again. But for now, he and the Desmosedici might just be the strongest package out there.

For Marquez, it was yet another disappointing defeat at the hand of a Ducati rider in the final lap. That said, he couldn’t do much about it. The Ducati gets out of the corner better than the Honda, it has more power in the straight than the Honda and it has better braking stability than the Honda. You can’t fight that. Marquez was over the limit trying to fight the Ducati of Lorenzo in this battle, and when that happens he normally wins. In fact, against any other bike, he wins 9/10 times. Even still, Marquez can be content with his effort in Austria, he beat one Ducati in their best track, and he extended his championship lead to 59 points. The title is still his to lose, and ultimately he knows that in the long run – pas this year – Dovizioso is probably his main threat over the course of the season, and Marc demolished Dovi this weekend.

Dovizioso’s problems started before the race, in the tyre selection. He chose medium tyres front and rear, compared to his teammate’s all-soft choice. From the beginning of the race, Dovizioso was struggling to get the bike to stop , and the time he spent behind Lorenzo killed his race, because that was when he was the most comfortable. The mistake he made ten laps from the flag cost him one second, and after that for a couple of laps he couldn’t find a rhythm. By the time he found his pace again, his tyre was finished and the leaders were gone. A disappointing race for Dovi, but another podium strengthens his bid for second in the championship, and you would probably still expect the Italian to be more consistent for the rest of the season than Lorenzo, although Lorenzo now leads him in the championship by two points.

Fourth over the line was Cal Crutchlow, nine seconds back from the win, and 3.5 seconds clear of Danilo Petrucci in fifth. The critical thing for this pair, for the race, was the personnel. Both of them have factory bikes, but none have factory teams, and this is what makes the difference in a rear-tyre-limited/fuel-limited race like this one, because the factory riders have a lot more people working to find the perfect electronics setting, and the perfect fuel strategy. Still, it was Crutchlow’s best Austrian performance by far, after a ride-through in 2016, and a fifteenth last year. Ahead of Silverstone in two weeks, this is a great way for the Brit to go into it, as he looks to win his home race for the first time in his career.

Valentino Rossi and his team made a change in warm up on Sunday morning which allowed him to be more consistent with a used tyre. With this gain, he was able to half-rescue Yamaha’s weekend by finishing sixth, which was beyond his expectation. Of course, it was still a disastrous weekend for Yamaha, and Rossi is still without a podium in Austria in the top class, but the gains made in warm up they will hope can transfer to Silverstone, where they were strong last year.

Dani Pedrosa took seventh place. He got beaten up quite badly in the beginning of the race, in those first two hard braking zones at turns one and three. From there he pretty much followed Rossi through the pack to seventh, helped by some strong late race pace. The critical thing for Dani is a similar one to that of Maverick Vinales, being able to go fast in the beginning. There are circuits coming up which have the potential to be front tyre races, and if Dani can find what he needs, he may yet be able to make his whole MotoGP career winning one race in each season.

Eighth place went to Alex Rins. He was running sixth for much of the race, but was caught by Rossi and Pedrosa quite quickly at the end, indicating he ran out of medium rear tyre. It seems Rins ran into the same tyre wear issues that Suzuki teammate Iannone encountered throughout the year.

Johann Zarco showed what happens when you choose the soft tyre, but can’t manage it, as he came home down in ninth, despite a decent start from the Frenchman from sixth on the grid.

Alvaro Bautista managed to recover a top ten spot despite a difficult start where, like Pedrosa, he was beaten up in those initial stages. Alvaro continues to advertise himself fairly well, as he looks to seal himself a factory Ducati deal for the 2019 Superbike World Championship.

Avintia Ducati’s Tito Rabat looked to be having a strong race, running well inside the top ten for much of the 28 laps, but suffered a one-second-per-lap drop off with his soft rear tyre in the final five laps, in which he dropped from ninth to eleventh behind both Zarco and Bautista. Still, it was a strong weekend for Rabat, who seemingly didn’t need much on the electronic side to save his top ten spot.

The Austrian GP weekend was one to forget for Maverick Vinales. After his poor qualifying on Saturday – not helped by sensor issues – he could only manage twelfth place in the race. He made his typical poor start, dropping to 16th in the first lap, but didn’t have his usual late race pace. This weekend, Vinales complained that it felt like his bike had no power in the opening stages of the race. It’s hard to justify, from the outside, why that would be the case, but anyway, Vinales will be looking to the private test for Yamaha in Misano before Silverstone as an opportunity to make some progress on the bike, but you have to wonder how much he believes he can actually find anything positive at all.

An off-track excursion in the middle of the race cost Andrea Iannone badly. After that, he set four laps which were some of the fastest of the race, but he couldn’t follow it up. The questions are being asked of Iannone again – since he signed for Aprilia for the 2019 and 2020 seasons, his form has completely disappeared. This performance didn’t do much to help this situation.

A stunning start put Bradley Smith up into the top ten at the start, but by the end of the race the British rider had dropped back to 14th. Nonetheless, a good weekend at home for KTM, picking up some more valuable World Championship points.

The final point went to Takaaki Nakagami, who was the top rookie in fifteenth, 0.9 seconds clear of Hafizh Syahrin.

Aleix Espargaro could only manage seventeenth place on the Aprilia, just ahead of a struggling Jack Miller; then Franco Morbidelli was nineteenth whilst a somewhat disgruntled Scott Redding rounded out the top twenty, a performance and result which left him very open about his opinion on the workings of the team, and also the bike.

Karel Abraham came home in twenty-first place, whilst Tom Luthi was the final finisher in 22nd.

Xavier Simeon had enjoyed his best weekend in MotoGP until lap nine of the race, when he became the only crasher of the race.

Nine in a row. That is Marc Marquez’s pole record in Sachsenring. It is a stunning statistic that will likely go unmatched by any other rider in any track. But the endlessly left-handed nature of the German Grand Prix track lends itself beautifully to Marquez’s flat tracking background, where turning left is the way of life. But that does not mean that pole position was handed to him on a silver platter, by twenty-three other riders kneeling before him. It was mostly thanks to Marquez’ approach this weekend, which has been entirely focused around race runs. He put almost a full race distance on a tyre in each of the first three free practice session, and didn’t bother to try a time attack.

This, obviously, hampered the reigning champion’s qualifying preparation, and handed a rare Saturday advantage to the rest of the pack. Most notably Jorge Lorenzo and Danilo Petrucci; the current factory Ducati rider towing his 2019 replacement to provisional pole position with just over one minute left on the clock. But finally it was Marquez who took pole, by 0.025 seconds from Petrucci, with his very final lap, the value of such a result highlighted by the #93’s celebrations.

Second place for Petrucci was probably better than he had expected. Danilo had been around the top times all weekend, and had looked good over one lap. But still, to beat both the factory Ducatis and the Yamahas in qualifying is quite an achievement – especially at a track which historically should not suit Ducati. The problem for Danilo is race pace, which he admits is a different story to qualifying, but if he can get some track position at the beginning of the race, anything is possible.

Jorge Lorenzo might be a little annoyed when he watched qualifying back when he realises he towed Petrucci round for his fastest time, something which Petrucci thanked Jorge for in the parc ferme after qualifying. Even still, at a track which no one expected the Ducati to go well at, Lorenzo is on the front row, less than one tenth off a pole position set by the most prolific pole hound both MotoGP and the Sachsenring has ever seen. But, as for Petrucci, the key to victory lies in the tyre life, an area in which Ducati seem to have regressed this year and in the scorching heat of the Saxony summer, is a big factor this weekend.

Maverick Vinales is off the front of the second row tomorrow after a solid qualifying session. Both he and teammate Valentino Rossi are suffering with wheelspin this weekend, but this time it is Vinales who is making the most of the situation, and has looked to have a little bit of pace over his more experienced teammate. The qualification was an important one for Vinales, too, because from there, even if he makes an average start, he should be in a decent position going into turn one – one from which he can recover. The number 25 is in the hunt for the podium, but like the Ducati riders the key is going to be making the tyre last.

The third and final GP18 on the grid tomorrow is Andrea Dovizioso, who is without a podium since Mugello but has looked strong this weekend, and seems to be the only one who can go with Marquez. With this in mind, it is essential that Dovi makes a good start from the middle of the second row tomorrow so that he doesn’t have too much work to do in the opening laps to be in contention. Of course, the tight layout at Sachsenring which features no real straight is difficult to overtake on, so making positions off the line will be essential for Dovi tomorrow if he wants to have a shot at Marc.

Sixth on the grid for Valentino Rossi looks quite good considering that at the end of yesterday he was seventeenth, 0.8 seconds off the pace. He has had some decent race pace, too, able to lap in the high 1’21s which looks at this stage as though it will be podium pace. There are many riders in that fight, though, including Lorenzo, Vinales and Petrucci, so Rossi will need a good start from the back of the second row if he wants to be in the podium battle. However, of all the riders theoretically in that fight, he looks to be the most fragile with the tyre, perhaps even more than Petrucci.

Cal Crutchlow has had a difficult weekend, but recovered well today to take seventh on the grid. He is another who can be in the podium fight. Andrea Iannone and an impressive Alvaro Bautista join Crutchlow on the third row.

Dani Pedrosa looks back on some kind of form, and has a good race pace with podium potential, but if he wants his first rostrum of the season he will have to recover well at the start as he qualified only tenth.

The Suzuki of Alex Rins is on the middle of the third row tomorrow, in the middle of the Honda sandwich, between retiree Pedrosa and rookie Takaaki Nakagami, who had a brilliant qualifying – making his second Q2 of his short MotoGP career.

Johann Zarco qualified fourteenth, but thanks to a six-place penalty for Aleix Espargaro – for blocking Marc Marquez in FP3 – the Frenchman will start thirteenth alongside Jack Miller and Pol Espargaro on row five.

Bradley Smith, Hafizh Syahrin and Tito Rabat make up row six, whilst Espargaro’s penalty dropped him to nineteenth, and will be joined on row seven by Scott Redding and Franco Morbidelli’s replacement, Stefan Bradl who was commentating yesterday morning before he got the shout that Morbidelli could not continue.

Tom Luthi, Karel Abraham and Xavier Simeon make up the back row of the grid, whilst Mika Kallio will not start after his huge FP2 crash yesterday in which he suffered ligament damage in his knee.

Featured Image courtesy of Gold & Goose/Red Bull Content Pool

Since 1949, world championship motorcycle racing has visited Assen, annually, without fail. This will therefore be the 69th running of the Dutch TT as a world championship race, and an important one, especially for Yamaha.
It has been way over one year since Maverick Vinales last won a race, back in Le Mans 2017, but for his teammate, Valentino Rossi, and the Iwata factory, last week marked the one-year anniversary of their last win. Furthermore, the day of the race, July 1st, will be the 63rd birthday of Yamaha’s motorcycle division; so an important weekend for Yamaha awaits. Moreover Rossi,  second in the championship,  abit twenty seven points back,  he is not theoretically, out of contention – so a win this weekend would ensure that his deficit in the championship is cut to less than one race win. Also, Assen has long been one of Rossi’s best circuits on the calendar, perhaps his absolute best, winning ten times at the Dutch track in his, now, 22 and a bit season long career, even winning in a tough 2013 season. Assen may prove one of the best circuits for the Yamaha, too. Not only does the M1 suit the fast, sweeping corners which arrive after De Strubben, and the end of the first sector, but the usually cooler Dutch climate can work in the favour of Yamaha, who tend to struggle in the heat. That said, the forecast for this weekend seems remarkably stable and warm, like it was for World Superbike earlier in the year.

Rossi himself, has had a tremendous run of races since the return to Europe. It started with a difficult Jerez, where he lucked into fifth place thanks to the triple crash of Dani Pedrosa, Jorge Lorenzo and Andrea Dovizioso, and that was followed by three third places in the next three races: Le Mans, Mugello and Barcelona. Again, he was fortunate in Barcelona that Dovizioso crashed, but with the current situation of Yamaha, capitalising on the errors of others is more important than usual. The Mugello podium was also quite special, losing the front in almost every corner throughout the race to finally take his first Italian GP podium since 2015. But what about this weekend for The Doctor? The importance of this weekend resulting in a win ultimately means little; what is important for Rossi and for Yamaha this weekend is whether the M1 will be able to cope well with the warmer conditions and whether it can conserve the tyre sufficiently in the race to be there at the end.

For the #25 side of the Movistar Yamaha garage, the situation is different. Maverick Vinales has suffered ever since he went to Yamaha in the early phases of races, even in the first races of last year, even the ones he won. Many times after tests, or after Saturdays on race weekends, Vinales has said something along the lines of ‘We tried with the full tank, we’re happy. I feel good,’ only for the next race to see precisely the same pattern as the previous ones: a poor start, an inability to overtake or ride quickly in the first laps, followed by a final five or seven laps which are as fast as anyone else out there. Once more, after the Monday test on the day following the Catalan GP two weeks ago, Vinales claimed a step had been made with his M1, that he could go to Assen and finally make the start he needs to, to be able to make use of his late-race pace. Only on Sunday will we understand whether he will be able to fight for a good result.

But ultimately, the layout of Assen works well for Yamaha. And, typically, what works for Yamaha works for Jorge Lorenzo. The winner of the previous two Grands Prix is arriving this weekend with all the confidence in the world – who wouldn’t, after dominating the last two races? However, it is excessive confidence which Lorenzo blamed for his crash in 2013 which arguably cost him the World Championship that year, but more importantly broke his left collarbone and left a minefield of mental scars which have haunted the five-times World Champion ever since, especially when returning to the origin of the damage, which makes absolute sense. In 2013 he would have won, but the broken collarbone prevented that, although it did not stop him from racing (an act of relative heroism). As a result, Lorenzo has only one MotoGP win in Assen, back in 2010 – his first championship year in the premier class. Since then, Lorenzo has only had one podium in Holland, in 2015 – he was taken out by Marco Simoncelli in 2011, by Alvaro Bautista in 2012; the collarbone prevented a win in 2013; it rained in 2014, 2016, 2017. However, consistent, dry, warm weather – on paper – suits Lorenzo perfectly. But the Ducati has suffered in Assen in recent years (with one exception which we will get to later), its stability combined with a lack of turning making it a very physical twenty six laps on Saturday, and more recently Sunday, and none of them being particularly rapid. Maybe this weekend, Lorenzo can change that, and if he can fight for the win, that is a very worrying occurrence for the opposition.

That Ducati exception, came from Danilo Petrucci last year. If it weren’t for Alex Rins getting in the way at the end of the race when Petrucci was challenging Rossi for the lead, Yamaha could have been waiting for 13 months by now for a win, and Ducati would have signed a Grand Prix winner to replace the Honda-bound Lorenzo for 2019. The rain towards the end of the race played into the hands of the #9 Pramac Ducati rider last year – having nothing to lose helped Petrucci in those conditions. But this weekend has the potential to be a difficult one for Petrux, partly for the reasons mentioned previously about the difficulties of the Desmosedici in Assen, but also because the higher temperatures, combined with the old, relatively slippery Dutch asphalt and Petrucci’s aggressive riding style could leave him without grip at the end of the race.

Andrea Dovizioso struggled last year in Holland, relying on the late rain to allow him to fight for the podium, although he ultimately missed out. Dovizioso has the unfortunate situation this weekend of being on a motorcycle that does not particularly suit Assen, with a riding style which does not particularly suit Assen. Dovi brakes very late, carries quite high entry speed, but not much apex speed, which doesn’t really work in Assen. However, the factors which could work against Petrucci have the potential to work for Dovizioso, who is the master of tyre conservation. However, you have to say that the most likely rider is Lorenzo to end Ducati’s 10-year winless run in Assen.

Marc Marquez comes into this weekend with a 27-point championship advantage and, probably, as the favourite for the race win. Marquez has five wins in Assen, including three in a row in 125cc and Moto2 between 2010 and 2012. He is without a win in Holland since 2014, but with fair reasons: his Honda was subpar in 2015 and his ability to even fight for the win was impressive enough; 2016 was a situation where he had to think of the championship whilst sat behind Jack Miller; and 2017 was a similar situation to ’16 with rain at the end bringing out the rarely seen cautious Marc Marquez, although he still threw down a huge move on Cal Crutchlow at the Ramshoek on the final lap to take third place. Fair weather and a much improved RC213V compared to previous years could put Marquez out of reach on Sunday, although excessively high temperatures could see the return of the front tyre issues that have plagued the Honda rider in the last two races.

Unusually, Dani Pedrosa is currently attracting more attention than Marc Marquez, primarily due to his contractual situation. It is seeming more and more likely that the Spaniard will go to the proposed Petronas Yamaha team for next year, but the announcement of the team has to come before Pedrosa can announce that he is riding for them – and that is if he is riding for them at all. The warm, stable weather should help Dani this weekend, who has struggled at Assen in recent years, but was strong in Barcelona and feeling better physically ahead of this weekend.

Johann Zarco will be hoping for a stronger weekend for this round, having suffered in the last races. The Frenchman was on pole for the Dutch TT last year, and fought for the victory for most of the race until he pit for a bike change anticipating an increase in the rainfall which never arrived. Another potential dark horse this weekend is Jack Miller, who took his one and only MotoGP win in Assen back in 2016.

An unusually warm weekend in Assen awaits, with birthdays and anniversaries, the potential for a second triple-winner of 2018, but who will win the first Dutch TT to be held in July?

Jorge Lorenzo qualified on pole position for the Catalan MotoGP, with a stunning final sector on Saturday afternoon. It was his first Ducati pole and gave him the perfect opportunity to put his superior pace to use, and demolish the field as he had done two weeks previously in Mugello. His only real threats came from Marc Marquez and Andrea Dovizioso, who had shared similar pace with each other across the weekend and had the potential to upset Lorenzo’s rhythm.

Marquez made a great start, whereas Lorenzo did not, and made it into first place, with the buffer of Andrea Iannone’s Suzuki between him and Lorenzo. However, the number 29 ran wide when trying to pass Marquez for the lead on lap one in turn 10, allowing Marquez back through and the #99 Ducati into second place as well. This let Lorenzo line up perfectly a pass into turn one. Marquez defended the inside as hard as he could but Lorenzo was unstoppable on the brakes.

From there, Marquez tried to stay with Lorenzo and, despite looking at ease, he was clearly on the limit because, when Dovizioso crashed behind him at turn five on lap nine, he dropped the pace and let Lorenzo go by two seconds, preserving his second place and the twenty points that come with it.
Jorge Lorenzo’s pace in this race was incredible. Between lap seven and thirteen, his lap times were separated by less than one tenth of a second, and over the whole race only 1.2 seconds separated his fastest time from his slowest. This was vintage Jorge Lorenzo and when he rides like that, there is no one person on the planet who can stop him.

Of course, demolishing the best riders in the world two races running opens up inevitable questions about a World Championship challenge. Can he do it? Probably not, but possibly. Over the past two races we have seen that Lorenzo has the pace to win races, the problem is that they were both at circuits he adores. We haven’t yet seen how he might go at a circuit he is less suited to. Another problem is that he is forty-nine points behind Marc Marquez in the championship, and it’s perhaps fair to say that taking two race wins out of Marquez and with twelve rounds left is not so easy. Furthermore, Lorenzo is not as consistent as Marquez. Where a bad weekend for Marc in the remaining races might be a fourth or a fifth, it could be a lot worse for Jorge, especially if the track conditions are neither wet nor dry. Speaking of which, Assen is next, the birthplace of Jorge Lorenzo’s wet weather demons, courtesy of the crash he suffered in the Thursday practice at the Dutch TT back in 2013 in which he broke his collarbone. In the years since 2013, Lorenzo has only managed to podium in Assen once, in 2015 on his way to World Championship number five.

After Assen comes Sachsenring, another of Lorenzo’s weaker circuits; and the other thing that Assen and Sachsenring have in common is that Marc Marquez loves them both: he has five wins in Holland and is unbeaten since 2008 in Germany. However, if Jorge can somehow keep the gap to Marquez below fifty points after the next two races, the ones which come after the summer break are far more favourable: Brno suits, both him and the bike, as does Austria. He goes well in Silverstone and the Desmosedici won there last year in the hands of Dovizioso.

Misano is the perfect place to be an enemy, Lorenzo’s favourite role! Aragon is one of his best circuits during the season and he is the only one, other than Marquez to win there since 2013. In Japan too, Lorenzo moulds Motegi into his circuit by focussing on corner exit and acceleration from low speed, Phillip Island again suits his style, so long as it does not provide changeable conditions. He has always enjoyed Sepang and he was under the lap record there in this season’s winter test and lastly Valencia is another of his best circuits. Thailand is a question mark, but in theory the Ducati should work quite well there. So, Lorenzo can fight for the championship, but the next two rounds can eliminate that possibility.

For Marc Marquez, the race was perfect. He missed the win, but that does not matter. After Mugello, Andrea Dovizioso had closed down the Spaniard’s advantage in the championship to 29 points – a recoverable margin. But after Barcelona, Dovi is precisely as far back as Lorenzo: 49 points. Furthermore, Marquez’s advantage over the factory Yamahas increased to 27 over Valentino Rossi, with Maverick Vinales a further eleven back. With Assen and Sachsenring being races Marquez can definitely win, he could have the title all but won by the summer break.

Valentino Rossi’s race proved uneventful and yet it exceeded expectations. He did not have the pace of either of the factory Ducatis or Marquez, but the crash of Dovizioso allowed the number 46 to recover a podium position, more than he could have expected. In Assen next time out, it will be almost precisely one year since he or Yamaha last won a Grand Prix, but despite this the Italian is still in mathematical championship contention. There still needs to be more found from Yamaha with the acceleration of the M1, and what they tried in the Monday test after the race did not aid that, but with what he has there is no questioning the great job Rossi is doing, and in Assen you can never discount him.

Cal Crutchlow finished fourth. He was embroiled in a mid-race battle with Dani Pedrosa and Danilo Petrucci, but upped and left just quick enough to evade the attentions of Johann Zarco and Maverick Vinales when they turned up in the fourth-place battle with just a few laps to go. In truth, it seemed that Cal could have finished on the podium in the first part of the race. He took over one second out of Valentino Rossi when he was chasing down Pedrosa and Petrucci, and dealt with the number 9 quickly, only for his charge to be halted by Pedrosa, whose defence was very strong. Crutchlow also ran wide in turn 10 at one point to hand the fifth position back to Petrucci, and that meant that it was only with seven laps to go that he passed Pedrosa for fourth place. He duly departed, but was too late to do anything about Rossi. Anyway, a fourth place finish from eighth on the grid was a good result for Crutchlow, especially as he went against the Honda grain by using the soft rear tyre.

Dani Pedrosa did a similar thing, using medium tyres front and rear, rather than the hard-hard combination which was more expected from the Hondas. This worked for him in the beginning of the race, because he had enough grip, but also enough support, to make a good pace. However, by the end of the race, he had no rear grip left – edge grip nor drive grip – so he had little to fight Crutchlow with. Even still, he positioned the bike very well, which is why it took Cal so long to get by the number 26, but in the end tyre grip won out, as usual, and Pedrosa wound up in fifth place, just ahead of Maverick Vinales.

And what a disappointing race it was for Vinales. Through the weekend he had spoken about how he had worked to be more comfortable in the race, how he felt he had found something for the first five laps. But he had no chance from the start, from which he put the M1 in reverse and fell through the pack to the back end of the top ten. Whilst his teammate, Valentino Rossi, and also Johann Zarco, are able to be aggressive in the first laps, Vinales is not, and this issue must be fixed if he is to win races. This is not a new thing, though, it was the same last year: in Qatar, he did not get going until halfway through the race. It was the same story in Argentina. In Assen he crashed trying to recover from a bad qualifying and a poor start and he could have won in Phillip Island had he started better. The difference is that now, these poor starts ruin his whole race because he cannot overtake – whereas he was able to still come through to the podium or even win in 2017 after a bad start, in 2018 he can go nowhere. The worst thing for Vinales is that it is only him having the problem, and whilst he is suffering with this, the other side of the Movistar Yamaha garage is enjoying its fourth podium of the year and third in succession. Something has to change in the #25 box, and quickly.

One positive for Vinales, is that he was three seconds clear of Johann Zarco at the end of the race, which didn’t look remotely likely before Le Mans. Since then, though, the Frenchman has become a little bit invisible. It was somewhat expected in Mugello, because Johann struggled there last year, but in Barcelona, he finished fifth last year, so only seventh place this year seems a bit odd. But, next up is Assen, and for Johann that is the scene of his first MotoGP pole position which he took in wet conditions last season. Hopefully for him he can have another good weekend this year in Holland to get his season back on track.

Danilo Petrucci had a strong start to the race, but suffered towards the end, no doubt with tyre wear, and could only manage eighth place. seven seconds behind him was Alvaro Bautista who scored his fourth successive top ten finish with ninth place, a couple of seconds clear of the factory Suzuki of Andrea Iannone who had a bizarre race, going from challenging for the lead on lap one to being 24 seconds away from the win by the end, and down in tenth place.

Pol Espargaro took KTMs best result of the season in eleventh place, ahead of Scott Redding who had a good race to twelfth – a good result after probably his best weekend on the Aprilia. Thirteenth went to Karel Abraham, who was the final finisher. Franco Morbidelli was fourteenth, but classified three laps down.

Only fourteen classified finishers leaves plenty of retirements: Mika Kallio was the first to go on lap one; then Sylvain Guintoli crashed out two laps later; Tom Luthi went one lap after Guintoli; Aleix Espargaro crashed one lap after Luthi; then came Simeon’s exit with seventeen to go; one lap before Dovi crashed; then Rins retired with thirteen laps left; two laps later Taka Nakagami folded the front in turn five whilst trying to pass Bradley Smith, and took the British rider with him; Jack Miller crashed with seven to go; Tito Rabat’ Ducati blew up one lap after Miller bowed out; and finally Hafizh Syahrin had a strange crash at turn four.

A race of attrition, then, in the premier class for the Catalan GP, but it was Jorge Lorenzo who came out on top. Can he continue this form in Assen, or will Marquez reclaim his authority in the 2018 World Championship?