From one of the longest standing venues on the MotoGP calendar, to one of the newest. For just the second time, this was Balaton Park!
Moto3:
Before we even reach for our notes on this weekend’s race, an important plot-twist has hit the Moto3 Championship: Fernández was retroactively disqualified from the first six rounds after it was discovered that the two engines used in said races had been tampered with. The seals placed on these engines were broken, and this was a huge no-no in the rulebook, which resulted in the six-round disqualification.
This meant the Championship standings were scrambled to hell and back what with riders gaining positions and points in each race as Fernández’s name was yanked from the sheets. Kudos to the team doing all that mathing. Yikes.
On to the race at hand.
Three riders were handed single-use passes to the Long Lap Loop, after ‘disturbing’ other riders with their on-the-racing-line Dawdler’s Club shenanigans during qualifying. These were, in no particular order: Pratama, Bertelle, and O’Shea.
It didn’t take long for the action to intensify, with the first crash occurring at Turn Two on the opening lap. It appeared that Esteban, while on the inside of Pini, ran out of talent, resulting in Pini skidding through the gravel, while Esteban somehow managed to simply cruise through the same gravel.
Though not mortally injured, Pini limped away angrily.
Not long after the first crash, the second one happened, this time at Turn Five. There, Moodley and Danish decided on having a couples-tumble. So romantic!
Danish did attempt to return to the race, abandoning Moodley, but was quickly confronted by the Black Flag of NoYouDon’t. After this, he went to the pits, his team fixed his bike, and Danish rejoined at around Lap Four, just in case.
On the tenth lap, Carraro became the victim of a hijacking – his bike was literally carried away by a pack of sprinting ‘marshals’ as he stood at the edge of the track, seeming confused.
(We have it on no authority at all that the marshals in question were South African imports.)
The remainder of the race consisted of a short battle between Quiles and Almansa for the lead, and a massive five-rider scrap for the final podium spot.
Said scrap built up exponentially upon the commencement of the final lap, none of the five involved willing to sit back and fly the white flag.
It was this intensity that was ultimately their undoing. As they cannoned onto the back straight, Muñoz’s bike very violently buckled beneath him, sending the Spaniard hurtling over the handlebars – and straight into the path of the riders behind him.
Since they had been closely fighting for position, there had been little to no space for evasive action, which led to first Uriarte, then Perrone running over the hapless rider-cum-speed hump. Uriarte mainly hit the downed motorcycle, clipping Muñoz’s legs in the process, but Perrone went straight across Muñoz, appearing to have not only hit his legs, but his helmet, to boot.
While Perrone was spotted dazedly pushing his bike through the trackside fields, Uriarte managed to remount and cross the finish line.
Quiles, meanwhile, passed the checkered flag in order to claim his fifth win in a row, moments before the Red Flags came out. The standings were officially called as of the last completed lap, which meant the podium trio did not change, but Uriarte, having remounted, ended up getting fourth position.
Second place went to Almansa, which was mildly impressive considering he’d been released from hospital just days ago and was still recovering, and Carpe was third.
Moto2:
This Sunday we saw the two-hundredth Moto2 Grand Prix race.
Unfortunately for Canet, he hardly had any time to participate in the race, because he was spat from the track at Turn Twelve on the opening lap. He was seen hauling his bike upright, the machine drooling pebbles, Arón fuelled by red-faced anger.
You definitely did not want to be a Muñoz this weekend at Balaton Park.
During Lap Four, Ortolá leaned into Turn Three a teeny bit overzealously, sending him into a powerslide – and into Muñoz, who’d been innocently running his race. Though Muñoz put up one heck of a fight trying to resist the now-sideways bike’s advances, he ultimately ended up hurtling through the kitty litter, both bikes getting blendered to a pulp. Was Muñoz’s motorcycle on fire for a bit there??
A little later, Guevara was informed that he had to complete a Long Lap, for what the stewards deemed an ‘unsafe change of direction’ off the grid: when he’d pulled away from pole, Guevara veered sharply to his right, narrowly missing the riders behind him. This seemed a debatable punishment.
Veijer turned his bike into an on-land torpedo at Turn Five on the seventh lap, going very straight, very fast, as opposed to leaning and turning right.
While a gaggle of marshals helped him and his bike up, Veijer anxiously pointed towards the track, indicating his need to rejoin the race as soon as possible. Which he did.
Two riders forgot why parts of the track was painted bright green, and were reminded by means of a Long Lap Penalty each. These amnesic boys were Zurutuza and Baltus.
Having served his penalty, and kept off the green bits after, Zurutuza was forced to pull off the track for a slow crawl through the gravel, when a technical problem on the penultimate lap attracted the ‘Meatball’ Flag.
González claimed the win, with Salač taking second, and Agius third.
González and Salač decided to cross the finish line on their rear wheels in tandem – we approve. It looked bloody cool.
On the Cooldown Lap, a Guevara-relay spontaneously happened when Guevara’s bike seemingly ran out of fuel. He was passed from marshal to marshal, and it looked like he eventually managed to reach the pits safely.
MotoGP:
Post-qualifying, we were left with an interesting front two rows: row one was all-Spanish; row two, all-Italian.
Sprint Race:
The Saturday race was preceded by a smoky display of aerobatics by a show-off helicopter pilot. It was good. He gets ten out of ten.
We do not know whether this was purely an us problem, but the moment the race was due to start, the livestream kicked us out like a misbehaving pub-crawler.
We managed to get back in quickly, however, and it noticed us by the halfway mark, kicking us out once again. Much like an adamant pub-crawler, we rapidly found our way back again, and this time we were allowed to stay until the end.
Not that we missed very much.
Nobody crashed. Marc Márquez leapt from pole to finish without once ceding the lead. The sun shone down on proceedings gayly all race long.
Aldeguer did come close to eating tarmac. While snapping at Bezzecchi’s rear wheel like a possessed chihuahua (all chihuahuas are possessed, really) during Lap Four, his Ducati snapped violently going through the Turn Nine-Ten chicane in a motion that most definitely bruised the family jewels a tad. Nice save, Fermín. Sorry about the bruising.
One uncannily uneventful race later, Márquez (still only Marc there) claimed an easy victory, while Acosta ended up taking second, and Bezzecchi third.
Binder finished a very unceremonial sixteenth.
Marc was now on eighteen Sprint Race wins, levelling with Martín for the record number of victories in the Saturday race.
For the love of race podiums, Marc, please stop biting the medals. They’re never going to give you a chocolate one. We’re sorry.
Main Race:
We’ve seen many pre-race rituals and habits, but are frequently adding new ones to the list. This time, it was the pre-Sighting Lap multi-butt-grab ceremony of Bezzecchi before mounting his Aprilia. It wasn’t a wedgie-tug; each grab was a proper smack-grab of self-admiration.
While the smoky-show-off helicopter dude continued his show of mid-air stunts, a game of musical tyres manifested on the grid.
Chaos. Total chaos right out of the blocks.
Upon approaching Turn One for the first time, Martín made what one would call a huge mistake; his oopsie sent his Aprilia into a death-wobble so fierce, it would make seasoned bikers cry. His now-out-of-control bike careened into the side of his teammate Bezzecchi, and the resulting mass of bike and rider wiped out Aldeguer, Fernández, and Di Giannantonio.
Amidst the tsunami of bikes and riders, Raúl was seen leaping into the air like a cat which had just seen a cucumber at its feet, while Bezzecchi temporarily became the filling of a motorcycle-snackwich below.
Of all those involved, only Di Giannantonio managed to return to the race. Martín was carted off to the Medical Centre, where he wisely hid for as long as he could, fearing the scolding he was due to receive from the Aprilia bosses after he’d eliminated three of the four Aprilias from the race in one massive sweep. Didn’t they have a talk about friendly fire not too long ago…?
Post-race, it was announced that Martín would have to serve a Double Long Lap Penalty; we felt this was a rather mild punishment.
Viñales earned himself a Long Lap Penalty by mysterious means.
During Lap Six, Bastianini went for the widest line he could take around Turn One without leaving the circuit altogether, then decided to pull a classic move usually reserved for highway traffic, the ‘I merge now, good luck everyone else’ maneuvre. Unfortunately, Mir was occupying the bit of track where Bastianini was headed, and contact was made.
Kudos to Mir for that elbow-into-the-tarmac save.
Bastianini was quickly served with a piping-hot Long Lap, which he later followed up with a second Long Lapper for taking a shortcut at Turn Sixteen.
Back at the front of the race, Acosta had held Márquez (seriously, you know which one) at bay for half the race. It was around Lap Fourteen when Marc flipped a switch, and the onslaught ensued.
At first, Acosta managed to return Marc’s blows, even running through corners two abreast because neither rider would simply surrender to the other. Small miracle they both emerged still mounted on their bikes from all of that.
It took about two laps of absolute top-notch racing before Márquez took the lead from Acosta for the final time. We felt sad for Pedro.
Having made the save of the day a while earlier, Mir went flying off the track at Turn Eleven on Lap Fifteen, all on his own.
Quartararo was having a forgettable race, earning himself not one, but two Long Lap Penalties in short succession, both for cutting the chicanes.
We had to admit: Once Márquez passed Acosta for the last time, the race kind of… died. Sure, there were lesser battles down the order, but the excitement was gone.
Márquez crossed the finish line first, earning not only his, but also Ducati’s, one-hundredth race win in MotoGP. An apt way to celebrate your centenary year, Ducati.
Marc became the third rider ever to reach the century-mark.
Claiming a record himself, a record perhaps not as wanted, Acosta finished second, making it thirteen podiums without any of them being celebrated from the top step.
About ten business days later, Bagnaia crossed the line to take third.
Binder, helped in part by the mayhem further upstream, finished in tenth.
That concluded a manic racing weekend at Balaton Park Circuit. We were not left wanting.
~ Karr
