MARQUEZ NIGHTMARE
Reigning champ comes unstuck in Italy
Marc Marquez saw his title lead slashed from 36 to 23 points after an uncharacteristic race spill at Mugello. After what was his first crash out of a race since last year in Le Mans over a year ago, he was adamant that there was nothing to be gained by examining the causes too closely.
He said: “I don’t want to learn anything from the weekend because I want to forget about it! In the morning, I had a perfect bike and in the afternoon, it was completely different, and what I’ve learned from that is that we need to manage the situation better. I’ve also learned that I can crash again, but that’s something that I already knew! We’re human, we make mistakes, and it’s been a year since I crashed in a race, but last year I was 37 points back and this year I’m still 23 ahead.” Marquez was unable to find the right feeling on any of the four front tyres brought by Michelin (including a late addition to the allocation following last week’s test at the circuit). The result was a low speed crash after an incredible 38-metre front slide. “We struggled the whole weekend to be comfortable with the particular spec of tyres, but I wasn’t suffering that much in the race. Instead, the front folded quite unexpectedly, when I wasn’t pushing that hard, even though I almost saved it.
“I tried to save it and I tried to be quite powerful to pick up the bike. But it was downhill and the grip wasn’t so good, so when I hit the gravel it was over.”
But while he might have lost out on valuable points, there’s one thing that Marquez was clear about: that his chances of catching Jorge Lorenzo for the win were slim at best. “After the crash the bike wasn’t perfect but I was still on the same pace as the podium guys. But Lorenzo was faster than everybody else, he managed the situation better.”