MotoGP Roundup – Phillip Island, Australia
Windy, wet, windy, bloody cold, WINDY… Sunday at Phillip Island did not go as planned. Mostly.
Moto3:
Cold, wet, and windy – what a way to start off the Sunday racing.
Toba, Whatley, and Artigas had to start the race from the back of the grid due to contravening the rules earlier on the weekend; Toba and Whatley had to complete one Long Lap each, while Artigas and Muñoz each had to do it twice.
Four riders crashed on their Sighting Laps, not wanting to wait for the race to do such things: First was Moreira, then Bertelle, Holgado, and finally Pérez.
Moreira was in obvious discomfort after his tumble, but Holgado was straight up bleeding after his bike had its face torn off.
The race commenced with visibility within the pack about as good as it would be at a stoner convention. Surprisingly, there was no first turn carnage. What sorcery is this?
During Lap Two, Alonso’s bike refused to turn at Turn Four. Alonso managed to remount, limping his bike to – and straight through – Pit Lane.
Moreira called it quits after eight laps, going for a sit-down and some hot cocoa in his pit box.
On the eighth lap both Farioli and Ortolá lost it at Turn Four.
Muñoz went skidding across the grass on Lap Eleven. He got up, lifting his hands and asking his fallen bike: ‘What the heck man? This is no time for a lie-down!’
While running in a career-best sixth, Aji was flung across the snotty grass of Turn Eleven on Lap Twelve. Looked like he was on a slip-and-slide.
Approaching the eighth turn on Lap Thirteen, an invisible hand lifted Salvador from his seat, levitating him above a wobbly motorcycle before dropping and flicking him from the track.
Azman walked away from a Lap Fifteen crash, heavily berating himself as he went.
On Lap Sixteen, and from a dominating race leading performance, Fernández slipped at Turn Eleven. He managed to remount and join the race again in fifth thanks to a ridiculous gap between the top five and the rest of the pack.
Artigas dropped it on Lap Seventeen at the quickly becoming infamous Turn Eleven, while Pérez did the slip at the second turn two laps later.
At the front of the race, Öncü denied Sasaki the win with a scary wobble-pass on the final lap. Behind the Öncü-Sasaki one-two, local kid Kelso took third, making him the first Aussie on the Moto3 podium since Miller in 2014.
Öncü quickly pulled on a thick jacket in Parc Fermé, albeit over soaked leathers. Sasaki temporarily followed suit.
All three riders in PF were chattering and their bones clattering so loudly that it could be heard on the live feed. Kelso was so chuffed, he forgot he, too, should be cold AF.
‘He pushed me like a Chop SORRY sorry’ – a grinning, teeth-chattering Öncü.
Moto2:
It was still wet, cold, and even windier. Lots of riders had little scares going around on the Sighting Lap.
Acosta had a bit more than a scare – the Championship hopeful got punted from the seat at Turn Four, where a frantic seat-humping ensued in an attempt to restart the stalled motorcycle. The humping failed, and Acosta had to settle for a tractor ride back to the pits, where his team quickly brought his bike back to life for a back-of-the-grid race start.
Early on Lap One, López got ejected from the seat, landing on the track in the path of the oncoming herd. Miraculously, neither Alonso nor his bike were run over.
Darryn exited the race on the third lap, at the first turn, after noting in a pre-start interview how this was going to be a survival race more than anything else. Boy, was he right.
Moments after Binder Junior, Van den Goorbergh tumbled over the grass at Turn Four.
Also on Lap Three, Baltus went sliding off, his bike shaking its head at him as it ground to a gravelly halt. Baltus kicked the gravel. Baltus missed.
García was launched into a front flip over the handlebars on Lap Four that’d make a circus acrobat jealous. His bike decided to bolt for freedom, leaving Sergio in the dirt. Or wet rocks.
Directly following García, Salač came crashing down metres from Sergio in a cheap knock-off of his performance.
By now you’re probably wondering: were there any riders left to crash out?
Yes, yes there were.
Lowes spun out mid-track on Lap Five, managing not to get run over, and Dixon went piling off the exit of Turn Two, curling up in the gravel like a larva expecting to morph into a butterfly soon.
All sectors were under yellow flags at this point. It truly had turned into a race for survival with your ass freezing off.
Not long after Lowes, Casadei also slid from the race.
By Lap Nine Vietti went a-tumbling.
And by the time the front-runners started Lap Ten, the Red Flags began waving, signalling an end to the carnage.
Initially, a six-lap dash to the finish was foreseen, but soon it was declared that the race was over, and everyone would get half the points they normally would’ve gotten, seeing’s two-thirds of the race hadn’t even remotely transpired.
This resulted in Arbolino taking the win, Canet taking his traditional second, and Aldeguer claiming third.
Arbolino jokingly noted in his Parc Fermé interview that, conditions considered, they all should be getting double points. We’re inclined to jokingly agree.
MotoGP:
Sprint:
Was the Sprint even going to get off the grid? Or would it be blown away before it could even reach said grid?
The answer, which was received by many with relief, was no. The cancellation of the Sprint was announced thirty minutes prior to its planned start.
For once, riders seemed quietly relieved to not have to race. It takes a lot to scare a motorcycle racer out of a race, and relief was mixed with some disappointment.
A few riders took this opportunity to meet some fans, sign some things, and take some selfies. Miller was one of them – rumour has it that, by the time he returned to his team, Jack was completely naked…
Main Race Recap:
For the sake of my shaky sanity, and some continuity, the feature race that’d transpired on Saturday will be copied into this report as well. So, here it is:
How does one even begin to capture this race in words? Bloody Hell! Would be a good start, we guess.
It was the first time a feature race took place on Saturday since the Dutch Grand Prix of 2015. It felt weird. It was worth it. It was glorious.
Pre-race aeroplanes most impressive.
Marc Márquez on the grid: Starfingers! Shaaaaaa! Now, imitate large robotic clamp. Good.
Right out of the blocks, shoulders were aggressively rubbed, something that pretty much continued throughout the entire race.
Martín had opted for the less-popular soft rubber for his rear, a choice he might be regretting, in hindsight…
When trying to praise Marc backfires: ‘Marc’s the ‘only non-Ducati’ with an answer for the Ducatis. Apart from Binder, of course. And Miller’s in there, too.’ (Paraphrased, but it was funny enough to note.) They forgot that Aleix was right behind Miller, on a non-Ducati, too.
During the eleventh lap, Mir was gently assisted by Marini in a slide off at Turn Four, one unlucky wing getting shaved off in the process. He remounted, but was never seen again.
A rather forlorn Augusto Fernández was seen sitting on the grass his plough-playing motorcycle had just tilted over, staring out over the track in silent contemplation.
Remember mention of Martín’s potential regret in choosing the soft rear tyre? Well, after leading twenty-six of the twenty-seven laps, his once four-second gap was abruptly reversed. Suddenly he found himself crossing the line in fifth place, having been mauled by a pack of rapidly advancing, frothing-at-the-mouth riders all four of which wanted the victory – for different reasons.
After that insane final lap that had us chewing off our hands at the wrists, it was Martín’s teammate, Zarco, who came out victorious. The Frenchman was overcome with emotion, having waited a hundred-and-twenty MotoGP races to finally be added to the list of Premier Class race winners.
Obviously, a backflip was in order.
Bagnaia stretched his Championship lead, coming in second place after tailing Zarco past Jorge.
Rideless in 2024, Di Giannantonio claimed his maiden Premier Class podium when he came over the line in third.
Binder inflicted some added pain to Martín out of the final corner, while regaining some of the ground that was punted from him by an aggressive Ducati in those closing moments. This left him in fourth, which was still a darn good result.
That’s that for Phillip Island. Did we mention that it was stupid cold and windy as hell?
~ Karr
(My Patreon link. Just, you know, in case one might want to show some appreciation for the hours of toiling over a grubby keyboard: https://www.patreon.com/KarrbonCopy )
