CRASHES IN MotoGP
Why more riders are crashing this season
THAT FAMOUS OLD
racing saying, “If you ain’t crashing, you ain’t going fast enough”, is half truth and half nonsense. Yes, you need to crash to find the limit, but once you’ve found it, you won’t get very far if you keeping stepping over it. Every racer needs to find the limit, even MotoGP riders; in fact, especially MotoGP riders. In the fastest, most technically challenging championship of all, the difference between winning and losing is tighter than it’s ever been, which is why there are more crashes than there have ever been.
During the 2006 MotoGP championship there were 98 get-offs. Last year there were 215, an astonishing increase of 120 per cent during an era when fast-improving electronics were supposed to have made racing safer.
There’s been a general upward trend for MotoGP riders to throw themselves at the scenery throughout the last decade: from 98 tumbles in 2006, to 117 in 2007, 154 in 2008, 104 in 2009, 134 in 2010, 157 in 2011, 186 in 2012, 205 in 2013, 206 in 2014, and 215 last year.
So, what’s going on? It’s the strength of the competition, simple as that. When the front row of the grid is covered by two- or threetenths and the race is won by two or three seconds, riders have no option but to lay it on the line, every corner, every lap, so it’s no surprise they end up flailing around in gravel traps.
And what about this year? How has the move from Bridgestone to Michelin and the switch from tailor-made factory electronics to same-forall rider aids changed things?
Comparing seven of the first Grands Prix of 2016 with the same races from last year staged in similar weather conditions, the crash total has risen from 86 to 100. A sizeable increase, but Michelin had been out of MotoGP for seven seasons when they returned, so they are climbing a steep learning curve. Speed-wise, they’ve bettered one lap record, equalled another and been a second off Bridgestone’s pace at a couple of races. Their worst GPs so far have been Argentina, where 16 riders lost the front into Turn One, and Le Mans, where seven riders lost the front into Turn Seven. Both these corners feature bumpy entries that unsettle the front suspension and overload the tyre.
Nevertheless, Michelin have made great progress. At Jerez there were only two crashes all weekend, compared to 14 with Bridgestone last year. At Catalunya there were 12 crashes, compared to 18 last year.
Of course, it’s not so much the crashes that count, it’s more the injuries. At these 14 events from 2015 and 2016 there was remarkably little suffering in the MotoGP class. A total of just four riders were declared unfit to ride following accidents: Tito Rabat with a broken collarbone and Loris Baz with broken toes, both at Mugello this year, Cal Crutchlow with an ankle injury at Mugello 2015 and Karel Abraham with a foot injury at Catalunya 2015.
The current injury situation is a lot healthier than it was in 2010, the second year of Bridgestone control tyres, when a too-stiff rear slick construction caused many riders to lose control on the brakes and suffer corner-entry highsides, resulting in numerous broken bones and trashed bikes.