Three rounds in, the 2015 MotoGP World Championship has been full of excitement, unpredictability, surprises, shocks and revivals. However, what do I make of MotoGP heading into Jerez?
It has been a start to the championship that has turned the form guide of recent times on its head.
Valentino Rossi leading the championship after claiming two wins and a third in the first three races, Marc Marquez in fifth position in the championship, trailing Rossi by 30 points after comeback ride to fifth in Qatar, a frantic weekend, but in the end comfortable victory in Austin at the Circuit of the Americas, and an unfortunate collision with Rossi in Argentina.
Jorge Lorenzo has been rather ordinary by his standards, and Dani Pedrosa has had his injury issues, missing Austin and Argentina. Adding to this, the revival of Ducati after a lean period of results, and what a championship battle we have on our hands.
Rossi leading the championship by six points over Andrea Dovizioso heading into this crucial round in so many ways has been the real story of this year so far.
The continued revival and renaissance of Rossi, who is chasing his eighth premier class title, which would equal the total Giacomo Agostini, has in many ways turned the clock back to the glory days that he had early in his career.
He is riding as well as I think that he has ever ridden, especially his performance in the race in Argentina, which, except for one aspect of his performance, which I will go into later, would be right up there on the pedestal as probably one of best race performances that he has ever done.
Even Rossi’s teammate Lorenzo was in awe of his incredible performance saying to motogp.com that, “Valentino‘s race was unbelievable, he was able to go faster than anyone else with the harder tyre, he is in an unbelievable shape.”
Unbelievable has been the word to describe the revival of Ducati. Ever since Casey Stoner left the Italian factory team at the end of 2010, they have struggled to be competitive with the lower-ranked, or satellite Honda and Yamaha riders, let alone the factory riders of those two manufacturers.
However, a new philosophy in bike design and development, led by Gigi Dall’Igna, supported by riders Dovizioso and Andrea Iannone has put Ducati on course for a possible race victory for the first time since the 2010 Australian Grand Prix at Phillip Island.
If they can keep their noses clean, they might just be in with a shot of this world championship.
And what about defending world champion Marquez? A fifth place in Qatar after falling to last place on the first lap, a win in Austin after recovering from a mechanical setback in qualifying to claim pole position, and that incident in Argentina with Rossi has left the Spaniard on the back foot heading into the first of four home races for the season.
And to make matters even harder, he damaged his finger in a training incident, meaning he is under a fitness cloud heading to Jerez, where he dominated in the race last year. However, even if he is less only 90 to 95 per cent fit, you can be sure to see him fight for the victory in the upcoming races. Marquez definitely can come back in this championship, there is absolutely no doubt about that.
The controversial incident between Marquez and Rossi was a potentially decisive moment of this year’s world championship, and one that race direction decided to declare a racing incident.
However, my view may be controversial and may be totally different to the experts that work every day in the MotoGP, but as an observer from afar, I am going to say that Rossi committed an infringement of article 2 of section 1.21 of the FIM Road Racing World Championship Grand Prix Regulations.
That article states, “Riders must ride in a responsible manner which does not cause danger to other competitors or participants, either on the track or in the pit-lane. Any infringement of this rule will be penalised with one of the following penalties: penalty points – fine – change of position – ride through – time penalty – drop of any number of grid position at the rider’s next race – disqualification – withdrawal of Championship points – suspension.”
My view centres on the fact that Rossi did not give Marquez the realistic racing room to the point that Marquez had no chance of staying in the race, and thus crashing out of the race. Rossi passes Marquez down the inside on the brakes into Turn 5, he leaves racing room for Marquez, which he takes, Rossi tries to shut off the line, and both of them touch, Rossi is pushed slightly wide, but not unreasonably wide.
However, Rossi, knowing for well Marquez was right beside him, decided to cut deliberately right in front of him, taking out the front wheel of Marquez, and forcing him to crash spectacularly out of the Grand Prix of Argentina. If Rossi wanted Marquez to stay in the race, he would have kept his wider line, leaving him vulnerable to Marquez through Turn 6, and the run to Turn 7, and he still would have had a huge chance, without incident, of winning the race.
If you look at the lap prior to the incident through Turns 5 and 6, where the incident happens on the next lap, you notice that Rossi, who is behind Marquez takes a much less aggressive line than what he does on the next lap, where the incident occurs.
This clearly shows to me that Rossi committed an infringement of article 2 of section 1.21 of the FIM Road Racing World Championship Grand Prix Regulations, which the key first sentence says, “Riders must ride in a responsible manner which does not cause danger to other competitors or participants, either on the track or in the pit-lane.”
Under those circumstances, I would have no choice but to disqualify him from the Grand Prix of Argentina, thus handing the victory and championship lead to Andrea Dovizioso.
Despite this potential controversy, the 2015 MotoGP World Championship battle is alive and kicking, and is set to be a tight battle right to the very end of the season.
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