Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/1469992
With the winner settled, sec- ond was where the fun was. On Friday, the entire field pointed to the superiority of Espargaro and Aprilia's RS-GP in these low- grip conditions. His pole posi- tion only reinforced the idea that he was a prerace favorite. Thus, his frustration at being stuck behind Martin for long spells was understandable. Espargaro re-took second place with a neat turn-one move on the tenth lap, only to lose out at the same place six laps later. It appeared the Aprilia made the decisive move back again at the same place on lap 21, only for his first serious error of judgement of the year to hand Martin second and Zarco a surprise third. "A podium is amazing after three difficult races," said Mar- tin, who hadn't given up hope of overhauling the Aprilia before the final lap. Zarco, meanwhile, accepted his chances of third were gone. "Five laps to the end, I couldn't stay close on acceleration, I was losing the podium. Then the surprise on the last lap. I thought it was a technical problem, but when I saw [Aleix] with the arms up, I thought, he's celebrating…" Mir was fourth, putting a rot- ten run of results to an end, with Espargaro re-taking the fifth he had briefly lost to Marini at turn five on that painful final lap. Maverick Vinales was close be- hind in seventh after a gamble with Michelin's soft rear tire didn't bring the benefits he had The Australian was furious after he spun his way to a limp 14th place. There were no such problems for the man up front. Quartararo resembled a man on a Sun- day stroll, which belied some devastating pace. He was able to run 1:40 until lap 14. With his pursuers lapping in the 1:41 range, the 23-year-old gradually built up a commanding cushion to come home 6.4 seconds clear at the flag. If anything, it seemed his biggest opponent in those closing laps was himself. "When you are leading like that, you are thinking about really stu- pid things that you should not think on the bike," Quartararo said. VOLUME 59 ISSUE 23 JUNE 7, 2022 P85 with no reasonable expectation of making the corner. NOT HAPPY WITH NO PUNISHMENT The FIM decision not to punish Nakagami for his turn-one crash was met with incredulity by many riders. Francesco Bagnaia said he was "not angry, I'm just disappointed," by the decision. "[Nakagami] was 12th, and he was trying to overtake 10 riders in the first braking," said the Italian. "If I was not there, he was surely in the gravel, and his race was already finished." Rins believes the FIM Stewards, led by ex-World Champion Freddie Spencer, are not fit for this level of competition. "I already said to Freddie when I was there in Mugello, that in my opinion they need to penal- ize Nakagami with the same penalty as Deniz Oncu last year (when the Turkish rider was banned for two races for dangerous riding). But it's crazy. I mean for sure, and today they demonstrated on TV, that the Stew- ards are not at the level of MotoGP." NAKAGAMI OKAY Starting from the fourth row, Taka Nakagami made an aggressive start down the home straight, but was unable to hold his line at turn one and lost his front end, contacting Francesco Bagnaia and Alex Rins. After the initial medical checks at the circuit, the LCR man was taken to the Hospital General de Catalunya for further examination as a precaution. A full body scan revealed no broken bones, but Nakagami remained in the hospital overnight. He was expected to be discharged Monday, June 6, but was ruled out of Monday's official test session at the Barcelona-Catalu- nya Circuit. Briefly... Johann Zarco filled out the MotoGP podium.