MotoGp Races in India!

Motopod proudly supported by Road Skin a UK label specializing in protective outerwear for motorcyclists modern biker clothing that you can wear all day long and engineered to save your skin for the road for life visit road skin dot co dot UK Hello and welcome to Motopod the Internet radio show all about motorcycle road racing. This is episode 742 and today rich and myself are going to talk about the race that actually happened Although I didn't think it was ever gonna happen the Indian GP rich Where you went to India and I'm surprised that it happened. I was shocked that happened I was pleasantly surprised that it happened. We did have some visa issues. I think we all knew that that was gonna be there but I don't know how you see this, but I kind of think that the whole ideas of what happened with the Visas was a little overblown by some people in the media I'll let you decide who that may or may not have been but all in all I will give it a Thumbs up as far as a track.

I thought there was some technical challenging things I didn't remember from when they were when Formula One was last there. I never realized how much downhill it was from the first turn To the second turn up to the third turn cresting there and I didn't and I had forgotten about the big banked Positive camber turns eight and nine Although the bikes did not use the same one that the Formula One cars used but it was still the same basic idea What was your thoughts rich? It just first impressions about being in India? Well, I thought it all went off actually very very well despite some of the dire What's the right word kind of warnings that we were getting from some areas of the media? I mean you and I discussed some concerns about some of the photos that emerged a few months ago But you know fair play credit where it's due.

I thought the facility looked bloody good actually and I like you I couldn't really remember it too Well from the Formula One days because that must be pushing ten years since F1 was there Yeah, I think it was 13 was I maybe the last year that they yeah somewhere around about that I guess I thought the track was good Quite challenging quite technically as you say monster back straight a bit bumpy in places as we'll talk to About all sorry talk about but yeah overall very very good. I mean the racing wasn't super But that's not necessarily the tracks fault. There's some other reasons for that. But yes overall I'd say a solid seven eight out of ten for me. Okay, cool I think I'd be a seven seven and a half eight as far as you know, hey It's a new track something different not what we've seen before.

I did think they did yeoman's work to Make the improvements from the earlier pictures of what we've seen and hey it could have paint here could have paint there Little things that that needs to be done there at least it wasn't like when formula one was going to South Korea To because they had said that in that track they came back the next year There was still like food left in refrigerators and the pit boxes and things of that nature So we didn't have that problem. So I thought well, we're at least Progressing in the right direction. So, you know other than the normal little thing there, I think Is all pretty good And I know it wasn't an astronomical crowd and perhaps it wouldn't have been reasonable to expect one in year one But I think the crowd attendance figures weren't weren't too bad I mean, I didn't really show too much grandstand action and I don't know, you know, the old cynic in me always thinks Well, are they just hiding empty? stands, but you know I think they had something like a hundred and thirty hundred forty thousand or something over the weekend if my memory serves me right so not Too bad as a weekend total so I think sixty thousand on race day Yeah, or maybe it wasn't quite as many over the whole weekend But it wasn't it wasn't shabby by any stretch of the imagination and certainly not compared to some other places that we go to So I think overall the track Dawn everybody involved will probably consider it to have been you know, a pretty successful weekend and a very good first stab But you know breaking the Indian market because we've never raced that before obviously So and it is a huge market when you talk to wheels so huge untap potential. Yeah, I think this Track reminds me a bit of coda.

You have a long straightaway. You have empty seats along those straightaways We just do it coda. Um, you know, there's a lot of people that are there in the paddock, but they're in a Very they're on the main straight. They're in that front part. There's people like me who are on the backside of the circuit Where up on the hills with lawn chairs and things like that and so as you spread people out across the longer monger area bigger area, sorry Bigger area you lose count like people don't look like there's many people there because they're just sort of scattered around a little bit So I feel like it was sort of the same Same amount of people that like show up for the race at coda Also, I think the track is From what the riders say and after kind of looking at a lot of the onboards.

It's very technical Sort of like coda is so very and it's bumpy sort of like coda is so there's sort of seems to be like a Fair amount of similarity between these Which maybe explains why the Honda's did good I don't know but there was some other things that were were in there as to why the Honda's were good in moto 3 in moto GP That might have been as part of it as well But I think we really just need to start to get to it rich and we'll start off with Let's get into it. Oh moto 3 as I will start there Quickly a little word about moto. All right. Sorry qp1 Helgardo onto you Ogden Suzuki. Tobin our tickets are all in this first session Helgardo for the last three races cannot get himself to q2 through the first of it.

He's always in this First session here on she was a big surprise to me over why he was there But it wasn't going to matter what onto you did it all in this session because he was going to incur a Backrow start and a Long lap penalty for an incident that occurred in practice where he ignored a black flag and medical direction now He crashed coming into the pit entrance. Yeah, I Did not see the crash And I don't know if anybody had seen it. I don't know it isn't caught But he had crashed it took him a little bit of time to get himself up and then he proceeded I think back to his garage to which they Looked at the bike or whatever and then he went back out for practice, but he was then Black flagged for being back out there having not gone to the medical center Now I'm trying to understand I look I try to find the rulebook online I found some things about medical none of them were what I was looking for If anybody knows the exact wording of this, please email us but a pod motopodcast.com I want to know but I'm trying to find out what the definition is of when a rider must go to medical Because there were other people who were on the track later on who were there for what I would call a Significant amount of time who then got up and took back off on their bikes without any penalty being incurred yet onto somehow incurred the wrath of everybody Do you is there a nuance rich that you know of that? I'm missing. I have absolutely no idea Jim I've missed the practice sessions for the most part just good various things going on last week work and stuff So I didn't actually see the session when that happened and from what I understand what you just intimated I think possibly the incident itself possibly wasn't even caught on camera.

So a Little bit hard to judge but yes, I don't really know what that protocol is in terms of a requirement to go and have yourself checked over I mean, I'm not questioning the fact that that protocol exists it sounds like a very plausibly good idea to me because riders will naturally particularly with adrenaline pumping around their systems jump straight back on the bike when perhaps they oughtn't to but As you say we see people crashing and jumping back on their bikes all the time and not necessarily going passing by the The clinic so yeah bit of an odd one I would be fascinated and hopefully somebody will Illuminate our lack of knowledge on that one. Yeah and lighten us. Thank you That's I did try to find on the FIM site of the rule that they burned on to you for it could not find It in the book So he did have a fractured finger out of all this. So You know, maybe he you know Again, it's it's obviously there's a rule. We don't know it I don't know where to look for it in the book.

Someone knows I'd like to read it for myself So again email us if you know, I'm guessing Jim that the long lap was probably for Ignore, you know not going to see the medical director the back of the road start was probably for the black flag So there were kind of more than one incident that he was getting penalized for with different sanctions for each I guess I mean, I don't again. I don't yeah, I think he I think the penalty for ignoring the black flag Was a back row and I believe not going to medical was a take a long lap so That was there as well. However In the Q1 session It's kind of what you'd expect it for people to go through Aren't you would get through with Holgardo Yamanaka and Scott Ogden Suzuki was interesting. He never completed a full Account for timed lap because he would kept running wide at is that out of eight and nine There's a not maybe nine or ten. There's a there's a painted green area that the bikes have to Are not allowed to be on and he kept running across it.

So he never ever did have a timed timed one In fact, I've got a feeling one of the commentators said that he didn't set a A Legal time all day on Saturday and that's correct include the morning as well. Not just q1. So yeah bizarre Yeah, I can't believe he couldn't wrap his head around The limit of the track or whatever else that was going on with him But it seemed so bizarre that you could go all day Saturday and not have an official timed. Yeah Wow, I mean I Would think a record I would think so I would think not one that you want but That's gonna be a record I would hope I would hope that someone would have sat him down between sessions to say look you You need to stay within the limits of the track. You can't do this I don't know.

Maybe they were baked bike problems or extenuating circumstances for some of it they created him from from Having a lot but either way it looked like it was going to rain because the clouds had rolled in Before the second session and oh, yes it poured in the inner and the in the interim time between The end of qp1 and the beginning of qp2 for moto moto 3 They did delay the beginning of q2 for it because it was an absolute deluge There was no way any of us could have written in that anyone could have written it. It's completely out of there When we did finally get back to being able to do the qualifying It was a wet session that had been delayed. We learned that Helgardo would not run in q2 We also learned that finahti would not ride because he had a broken foot and he has been ruled out for Japan as well in weeks time and It was again. It was a wet session that was led by Masiya Bertoli Sasaki Ogden Toba and then Marrera all occupy the top six So that is how we wind up to go racing on Sunday in what was extremely hot conditions for the race in fact the It was so hot and humid that race direction cut laps off of every race That Sunday, I believe we got cut from 18 to 16 laps To 16 laps because I took All this was that rider discretion riders said this is too hot. We can't do this So they took a couple laps off of the moto moto 3 race.

So we were going 16 laps Masiya got a great hole shot Followed by Sasaki, Bert Bertoli and Marrera Anshu immediately took the long lap penalty Instantly as soon as he was able to go through he went in got that done. It was a good long lap He didn't violate anything in the long lap. So he was there On that same lap 15 Kelso had a massive high side He flipped himself off that thing like a ragdoll and beat himself up Bertoli was gone down at turn one. Helgardo had got up 10 points. He had got himself to eighth Everyone was expecting myself included expecting Anshu just to blow through the pack He had that 1.2 kilometer back stretch that you thought for sure he was going to be able to catch up with But he never seemed to figure out out like he made Very little to no progress Masiya basically was out front on the honda and We always say moto 3 is the best race of the entire day This was not one of the better moto 3 races you're going to watch because from this moment on Masiya leads the rest of the way home.

No one could touch Masiya He was out there. There was nothing that was going on Uh halfway through everything was very spread out. You had Sasaki and Masiya at the front Then there was this next little party of Uh, Colin Vyer, Toba Alonzo and Helgardo that were there they were kind of spread out amongst themselves We saw Suzuki crash and then um and his bike Uh, he crashed with with scott ogden They became tangled up um and in fact Sorry scott kind of high sided himself or low sided himself and Suzuki basically had nowhere to go So that was very unfortunate for Suzuki on that particular occasion Mm-hmm Suzuki's bike ghost rode well the way down to like the next corner Luckily the bike didn't go back onto the track and did stay off which was a good thing Sasaki lost a lot of pace off of Masiya. I thought maybe he had torched off the tires or whatever but the battle between um Toba And uh Colin Vyer was a really good battle that that went back and forth They really were going tooth and nail with each other With three to go Ancho had made his way to 15th. So he at least was going to be in the points but the Sasaki Toba and Vyer battle was actually pretty awesome It was definitely not for the win But it was decide who was going to be where on the podium and who was going to be the unfortunate person Off the podium Vyer was looking to be his first podium in moto 3 For it, but that battle raged on now ss Sasaki Toba and Vyer they swapped places Between Vyer and Toba at least two or three times, especially at eight and nine Uh, then the trio would go would go back basically crazy because it looked as though that Vyer was trying to help Sasaki Which may not have been the right thing because that put Vyer in a bad place Although he did go by Sasaki at one point, but he kind of fell back But Vyer tried to go around sort of the outside of Sasaki wound up getting bumped By Sasaki he fell off And that pretty much sealed everything that was going to go on and it was Masa Toba Sasaki Hulgardo Alonso Amunas Your top six from the race Interesting race you had to wait for that last lap, but that battle with Colin Vyer.

I think that shows that Vyer is a Contender that the kid has something and that uh believe he's resigned next year for the same ride, I believe So next year, I think Vyer's looking for I Vyer's gonna get a podium here towards the end of the season Maybe one maybe two Um the way the kid rides he might surprise at valencia when everything's all said and done Mainly just because I think some people are gonna be riding for the championship and some people are not So Vyer may sneak one sneak a win there, but definitely next year I look for big things out of Vyer I think he's the talent Um, he's really shown some consistency like he just somehow the switch just turned on for the kid and he's really Really done well with that He's a rookie. I think Jim is neat this year and yes Grand Prix his problem if anything because he's a typical dutch. He's quite tall So his physical size might become a bit of an issue for him We know that that gets worse year on year look at Anshu who we talk about a lot. So But yeah, he's a real fine, didn't he? And great to have a fast dutch rider again because you don't get too many of those coming along that often So it's it's good to have Another nationality mixing up the front but he did get himself in a bit of a pickle on Sunday kind of damned if he did damned if he didn't kind of territory in those last few laps, wasn't it?

Yeah I felt sorry for him because I think I think he started to overthink everything Oh crap. I really don't my teammates running for the world championship. I don't want to interfere with him I should run rear gunner. Wait a minute. I have a chance to be on the podium.

I should do that No, I could actually be second and he just I think he got overwhelmed Well, I think just went for it. I think the problem was the presence of Kaito Toba, wasn't it? I think if Toba hadn't been in that position then via would have just stayed behind Sasaki and just Played rear gunner not to rob him of any points that he needs in the championship But once Toba went by via he kind of had to do something about it Didn't they and then it all got a bit gloves off and a bit perhaps a bit over the top I mean Sasaki Did go pretty wide Defending his position on that what penultimate bend? And yeah because via was trying to go around the outside of him. That's how the collision happened So it was just one of those unfortunately I'd like to have been flying the wall in the pit garage when uh when the two got back at the same time But hopefully they've all made up.

It was just one of those unfortunate things that can happen Yeah, I don't think there was I don't think there was any malice to any of it. I no no No, it just it's racing and it was racing in a weird spot with a kid who's a rookie at a world championship level against someone who has Who has a chance to be a world champion? And the kid was trying to do right by his teammate, but he was also trying to do right by himself and he got all confused and you know There was red mist there was clear mist there was everything was there and And actually short end of the straw in part firm a Sasaki did say in the post race interview that he his front tire was gone With sort of six to eight laps of the race remaining Which is why he dropped back into the fire tober battle in the first place and fell so far behind masiya And I guess defending as hard as he was In that penultimate turn he kind of understood the bike I guess because he just ran out of front grip at that point. So yeah, just one of those really I agree Um that really did a big shake up to the point standings here Holgardo's inability to be on the podium and to be at the front for these past three races Has seen how guardos lead shrink to Take a guess Zero He is he is level points on dwam asya. I had masiya written off for this championship about About seven races ago.

I just we were like wow the honda isn't any good this year The ktm is a far better bike to be on or any of the clones of it, right? And here here wal masiya after having gotten his deal to ride moto to next year Has literally turned things around Now there's some theories about why the hondas were good here in india that some people were saying that look that the Humidity and the heat had very little effect on the hondas But it had a much bigger effect on the ktms The ktms weren't able to you exercise their accelerate like Acceleration advantage that they have again. I think the track probably flattered the hondas because there really isn't any stop-go Places on this track. Yeah, i'll give you turn one and turn three are pretty tight But it's a matter of just getting off of there decent And getting yourself down that long stretch then the flowing section towards the back You really don't it reminds me again a little bit of coda my home track No one really passes through the s's well No one's going to start passing from turn roughly turn five all the way till you get packed to 10 that There's there's nowhere you can't pass although we did see vire and all them do make passes in The big positive camber bank turns eight and nine, but they were spectacular passes only because that turn allowed you to have two lines That you could run and if you had a bike that you could turn it was definitely easier for you to make it through those sections there, but Maybe the humidity was an issue. Maybe the hondas just didn't have as much of an issue with it It could be the way their air boxes are configured all those little things mean a lot especially on those single cylinder bikes but either way hergardo and masiya are tied for the lead for the points but Sasaki is a mere one point behind.

This is now a very much a three rider battle for the world championship helgardo Has got a heath ton of pressure on him. He's been the championship leader the whole time I don't want to say he's expected to win the world championship But you got to believe that given the lead that he had he was sort of expected to be that Although however, there was a kid a little while ago who rode for the ktm team who had a really big lead Lost that lead in the championship, but did recover to win a championship So let's not put it behind how guard of that. He's not going to straighten himself back out here And get you get on there. Oh Go ahead. It is a curious slump in form though.

Jim, isn't it? Yeah, it is It's not so much I mean masiya's had a good few races. It's true, but let's not forget. He's chucked it up the road in silverstone So this is not this is more. I mean holgardo is doing a bit of a banyan at the moment He's bringing himself back into the title battle Which is not something that you want to be doing squandering the sort of lead that he had now It must be said that he did recover on sunday in india to fourth, which was actually a pretty good recovery job given where He started on the grid but Yeah, I mean it's more him dropping back isn't it and it's is it pressure?

I mean, he's not a rookie he had his first season last year So he's got a little bit of experience under his belt But I guess you just get on a run of bad form and stuff just doesn't click does it for a bit? So the test for him like it's going to be for somebody else that we're talking about later Is can he just kind of steady himself? Galvanize himself whatever the word is and just sort of push on from here because this is a crushingly difficult period of the season now with these Races one after another and it would be easy to get in a rut and he has been in a rut for a while He will take some comfort from finishing fourth. I expect because that was a good ride under the circumstances Yep I think alonzo is Not out of it, but he is 23 points behind the leader He needs help to get there Uh, aren't you? I hit this penalty here for him ruined his championship.

He is done For getting a championship. He is 28 behind. I don't I think that's insurmountable. Um, alonzo has maybe a chance at it and it's slim I there's good. Hey anything can happen.

I understand that first turn and all three of these guys could be on the ground Yeah, still and there's still quite a lot of races to go I mean, there's all sorts of stuff that can happen and the shanigans normally happens in m3, doesn't it? So I wouldn't quite rule on chua. Yeah I It's getting slimmer right imagine where he would be though if he hadn't had so many penalties this year because he's lost You know a shed load of points now you could say that he's created penalties for himself in most cases and that would be true But you know a few years ago when we didn't have this kind of mad penalty Giveaway system that we have nowadays. He'd probably be leading a championship wouldn't he but somebody can go and do the analysis on that What is it you said rich about aren't you the his entourage is his problem It's almost like his arrogance of the black flag and his other times that he's been penalized are almost Like it's almost flagrant arrogance against the sporting against the sport which is interesting um Again, that was certainly a criticism. I had of him a few seasons ago I mean last year at tech three and certainly this year in the io squad You know, we've said many times how much mature he's been But now yeah ignoring black flags is just what's the point of that?

You know, I mean, okay, you might say he didn't see it, but that's not really a An excuse you can get away with now because there's so many boards flashing away at you so many Marshals showing you your number and stuff you it's hard to see how you can even contemplate using that as an excuse these days. So Yeah, I mean they're very young these people aren't they so you get a rush of blood to the head or whatever and just think i'm not doing it but He's costing himself masses masses masses of points and he won't get another shot in moto three Because we know he's going up next year and he won't come back down again. Well, it's hiding and likely You know, I want I wonder if the way he's riding trying to carry maximum corner speed Through the whole time because he he's gonna lose something because of his weight and his size It causes him to be flirting with the gremlin of track limits I mean it's plausible In the realm there just to correct you slightly to defend myself a little bit. Um, I don't think I ever really talked about on chou's entourage in terms of his Is kind of Having a bad attitude so much. It's just that the keen and soft wog glue kind of camp Is just known to be extremely aggressive in the way they ride bikes, you know There's just no holds barred and in the past we you could definitely say that on chou was very very guilty of causing collisions that were Avoidable just by being over aggressive and now as we were talking about john teaser john on twitter Had made the point that he felt on chou was entirely to blame for that Collision in the last turn at bar slough a couple of races back And yeah, I mean that is the old on chou coming through that i'm going through and if you come across my line We're gonna hit each other.

It's that kind of attitude That's the bit that we used to criticize him for a lot more not so much necessarily the behavior of people around him But and he has as I say, I think matured quite a lot for the better over the last couple of seasons with the sort of Stewardship of you know, hervay ponchard in tech three and then obviously akiayo this year But yeah, it's a shame to see him. I mean, he's not languishing in fifth place as he's only 27 points back But yeah, I mean it is going to be quite a stern challenge to get back all things being equal Yeah, it perhaps poor choice of wording online to say his arrogance But there's something About him the past few races that is definitely different. I'm not sure Exactly what it is. I look at it as sort of You know mockery of well, I can do what I want kind of a thing which I think is Arrogant which may or may not be he's his demeanor has changed a bit when you see him in the box He does look like a man who's getting a bit fed up with always getting the finger finger pointed at him, but He's the one on track Shoe fit to point exactly. So, you know what your reap is what you say So All right.

Well, okay. I think that covers pretty much everything that happened in the moto 3 race. Shall we move to moto 2? Yes, if we must We must It's the order in which they race them folks Oh moto 2 qualifying qp1 Oddly we had vander gerberg govara connect in the first session of qualifying without agar Aranis In there that I thought was wild that kenett and a couple others were in that session goes to show Moto 2 has depth but for kenett to be there. I was like, oh, that's sort of the big name That's out of place going on but vander gerberg uh garcia Binder and Baltis All got out of that session to go to the second session now Remember this was a wet session because of the rain in the deluge that happened So we were in a wet session.

We got to the second moto gp moto 2 Qp qp2 session. I can't speak today. Sorry guys uh The wet it was still wet but it was drying With about six and a half minutes to go. There was a dry light forming I don't didn't think anybody was gonna You know No one was going to be able to have time to stop And get on on slicks if they had a two bike roll and you had a bike with slicks somebody May have thought about trying it, but they did it but the last Minutes of this qualifying session was absolutely awesome with what went on Um akasta was leading dixon garcia bender and arbolino But akasta would go wide which caused him to lose the corner and then dixon would nip through or sorry, i'm sorry akasta was on a fast lap because You got into this wet session and it was like Whoever was going to be the last person to get across at the end to get one more lap Was going to be the person who probably was going to be on pole akasta made it with just time to spare dixon would make it as well Because these two were starting to trade top spot Akasta had a time going that was going to put him on pole and stretch his Advantage however, he did lose it going into the last turn ran why? Lost his drive and that allowed dixon to road what could arguably be said almost the perfect lap to snatch Pull away from paige or akasta way to go brits You guys love the ring dixon which wind up on pole which was awesome Akasta would be in the middle of the front row great qualifying for akasta because he's had A few races here where he's not been on the front row.

He's been languishing on that second third row area garcia Using track knowledge from the first session would be third and then you had vander garborg bender Lopez and arbolino there arbolino at least getting in to that first two rows where he's had trouble qualifying there as well Yeah, so that gives us the lowdown of Qualifying when we went into the moto 2 race Again, this race was shortened was down from the Where did they go from the 21 laps to 20 laps was the 18 was the original distance? I think they went from 20 to 18. I think they knocked two laps two or three laps came off. Yeah So this one they started the race and in the first turn was a huge crash of silver riders chantra alcoba vieti Ramirez and hoda were all in this crash in the beginning There was like three bikes that wound up actually on top of each other which necessitated a red flag Because there was no way the corner workers could get enough people out there in time to clear All these bikes off of the track so that they wouldn't be and they were in a They were in the impact zone of the first turn So if there was another group of riders that was coming through there, they were going to be in the impact zone A good call by race direction I think to red flag this one to get the support out there that they needed to be sure as well to check on the riders that were involved in it vieti got up very slowly from his From the crash. He was a pure victim of circumstance The back end of his bike was clotted by the other guys that were tumbling through and he was Violently flung from his motorcycle and what I can only describe as a flat propeller being spun around As he then crashed into the ground i'm sure vieti didn't really know where he was for a little bit on that one Um, I think it kind of took the wind out of him literally Uh plus with the fast heat and humidity had been tough to get yourself back together again with that one We wound up understanding that it was definitely alcoba's fault for this one Uh way too late on the brakes for it for that short run into the first turn But everyone is sort of trying to make everything happen At the start because when everybody kind of gets into a line We kind of go stagnant a little bit You don't see it as much in moto 3 you see it a little more moto 2 and you see the whole lot in moto gp So there was definitely some rg bargy going on at the first bit of it.

Um fair and just For alcoba to get the blame rich Yeah, I found it quite hard to unpick The incident itself because like you said jim there were so many bikes involved with it and so much going on it was a little bit hard, but he was certainly judged to cause the incident and I mean, he's got a bit of a reputation for moto three days, let alone moto two isn't he jeremy alcova. So Yeah social media was going as usual swivel-eyed bonkers in its condemnation of him But he does need to sort himself out a little bit because you know, he took a lot of riders down there and Yeah, it's all a bit I can't say it's unnecessary because like you say you The first lap and the first couple of turns is where you're going to make a make a break your race I suppose but he just needs to Calm it down a little bit because he's been all right in moto 2 but he has caused a lot of crashes and You know, he'll get I'm sure the stewards tried to be fair about this But there's no doubt that certain riders if they have that reputation will will feel you know get their collar felt More and perhaps a bit harder than others So under the circumstances double long lap, which we'll get to because that didn't actually end well for him anyway, but Probably was a fairly light penalty really I thought it was only a single lap long lap penalty. Was it a double? I'm pretty sure we got i'm pretty sure we got a double. Yeah, really?

Okay. All right I I marked it as a single long lap. I might need to just double check my notes But I think it was because I thought he did the first one. Okay, and then I didn't think he made any of it successfully, but Well, okay, I'll have to double check now. All right, you double check and I'll I will talk us through the race So the only man who was not happy to see a red flag out of this Was arbolino who went from seven from seventh to first in five corners?

That was a heck of a set. I was a heck of a display of writing from arbolino. It was Almost as if you said hey the real tonny arbolino has now reappeared in india as well And he is fighting tooth and nail for this championship alcoba By yes rich. Sorry. I've just been reading my notes.

So you're right jim. It was a long lap penalty But he failed to take it in time. So then he had us and so then he got a second long lap penalty That's why he went through twice. Yeah, okay, that's Just to correct myself. No, you're fine.

I I thought I had incorrectly marked only a single long lap penalty I Had did not note that he had did not take it in time Well, okay as his restart would happen vieti would not make it neither would hoda now chantra was interesting. He had his bike Down it took him a while to get it restarted again. You've got that five minutes to get back thing going on Then what was interesting to me was chantra chose to take the rest of the lap as opposed to going back In through the pits right away I don't know whether he felt like he was too far like he was gonna get penalized if he would have gone backwards on track I'm not sure what his thinking was sometimes you do not make clear decisions in an emotional moment such as that But he was however able to get the bike back his team did a yeoman's work to actually put another fairing back on that bike Sadly chantra would retire with other problems with the bike that maybe perhaps weren't immediately Noticed by him on the ride back to the pits or the team didn't have time and thought maybe perhaps they weren't going to be A problem either way. It was a sat-in for chantra who had showed signs of pace during the weekend Well when we got to the restart we were only going to be 12 laps because we had that's the normal procedure We had a complete restart. We take three laps off of what was there.

So we were at 12 And we started out so on the re on the second restart agura Lowe's they all had crashes at turn four at the beginning but Acosta got the lead Arbolino was next followed by gracia lopez And uh dixon who fell back a little bit from his pole position Lopez and then dixon were down at turn four and my question is who was actually at fault rich in that one? Because I thought it was a bit wild a bit crazy But no further action was taken from my knowledge Yeah, well Let's just roll back a little bit on. Okay. I mean i'm a great admirer of alonzo lopez I'll just make that perfectly clear and you might remember when we were sort of talking about the end of last season he was one of my star performers of last season and I had him as a An outside bet as a championship contender this year that okay that hasn't happened but On both of the starts He absolutely threw it Late on the brakes up the inside and caused a lot of people to jink out of the way now My attention was kind of taken by him doing that and that's why I didn't really see what happened with the alcobra incident first time around And he did exactly the same thing on the restart and then as you say fast forward a lap or two he kind of He's died with dixon at the end of that long back straight dixon went a bit wide Did he go wide or did i'm trying to think The angle that the accident happened at it looked as if lopez completely chopped dixon and that's how the contact happened I think when you kind of replayed it and sort of from a different angle Yes, I thought race direction got this one right actually jim as big of an admirer of jake dixon as I am obviously but It was just two into one doesn't fit And that the result was just a crash, you know, it's just just one of those really and i'm actually in that situation Where it's so hard to sort of say well, yeah, it was definitely this and well definitely that one i'm glad that race direction didn't kind of make a bad call with penalizing one person rather than the other or Penalizing both of them. It was just a racing incident very unfortunate but Yeah, they were just trying to both occupy the same bit of tarmac at the same time and there's only one outcome from that So, I mean did you see it differently?

Because my initial reaction was to shout an expletive at the tv and it was aimed at lopez's direction But on reflection, I think that was wrong with me to do that And it does go to show that you need to see these things from a few different angles really to get a full picture Yeah, I My thinking was at first Was racing incident two guys wanted the same piece of track Um, but I was I was scared that race direction was going to be well lopez has been chucking it upside of everybody He we need to send him a message and I thought they were going to give him like a long lap or something Like that, but I think the call was correct um Both of those guys would remount they were just low sides. Basically. I so they both were remounting now up front Acosta just started to put time on everybody and Basically, acosta would ride off into the sunset to win this one It was the second race of which of the day which in which there was no passing for the lead And it was a not necessarily processional but it was acosta's gone Um and whatnot now dixon would fall again a lap later. He would do it at turn 12 Uh, it was very interesting. He clipped the inside curb Which vaulted the front end into the air?

And it was a good One two inches off the ground and when the tire came back to match the pavement it did not work because there was a Set another bump just in the track right after that that allowed Dixon's front end to completely fold and off the track that jake went What could have been a great weekend? It seems as though jake has the highest of highs By winning and then becomes the next weekend is the lowest of lows by crashing himself out which A lot of that is not necessarily jake's fault But he does seem to not nail the start Of these weekends sometimes the start of these races. I'm sorry not weekend started these races like other riders do Um bad things happen in the middle of the pack and you definitely don't want to be there He dixon seems to be there more often than not But if he can survive, yeah, jake is formidable. So if there's There's any criticism I could throw at any of these guys and I really Can't do that, but it seems like dixon needs to figure his starts out He needs to make a slightly better start to be in to be that top one two three Especially when he qualifies on the front row. He needs to stay there.

He can't really afford to be pushed out or go backwards and he's kind of Like a lot of riders you would say over the years of motor and sam loews is another fine example of this On a given day Completely unbeatable. Yeah, I mean untouchable But those days are very very infrequent now jake's days like that are becoming more frequent and he's certainly getting much faster in terms Of qualification and stuff but his starts have always been an issue for whatever reason he is again He's one of the bigger taller riders So there might be a slight weight kind of disadvantage that he suffers there. Well, there's not a scrap of extra on him Uh like with all of these riders, but you know you look at a pedro costa and he's you know He he's deadly now because he's fast and he's just metronomically consistent as well. And if he you You must have crashed a couple of times this year. Well, i'm struggling to remember one But he's he's now at that okay, but he's now at that stage where a bad day for him is a third Didn't it?

You know, and that's that is how you win a championship in moto 2 of all classes Yeah, but i'm kind of interested jim to ask you What's your take on this thing about the lack of overtaking at the front? You know the fact that there were two or three guys in each class that just mastered it But there are big gaps everywhere. Do you think it's just a new track and some people haven't adapted me Look at aran connect, for example Nowhere all we can crashed out of the race Didn't get through to q2. Maybe because can't learn new tracks or maybe he was ill, I don't know But I mean anything's possible in some parts of the world, but it was like in moto 3. I thought it was Noticeable that the guy virtually the most experienced guy in moto 3 was the one that adapted and just sailed away at the front Whereas the the younger more rookie kind of guys that they just kind of got split into little groups But you would have thought it had been a big slipstream in battle with a straight back straight like that, but it just never happened Did it?

No, it was kind of similar Yeah, um I don't have a good answer uh, it's easy to say well we're going to a new track but uh on the flip side of it Hey, you guys are world level motorcycle racers. You should be able to learn a track in a short amount of time the First practice sessions of friday were all lengthened for everybody to have that extra time to become available to the track to to uh What am I trying to say? Yes become accustomed to the track and find its nuance and whatnot one of the Most crucial things you can do when going to a racetrack that you've never raced at is to walk that racetrack I don't mean get your scooter out. I don't mean get your bicycle out. I mean walk it Physically go walk it because you will find the bumps You will find the little things in the track that you need to know before you were ever out there uh I think that one of the reasons that we saw this Disparity of no passing had to do with the heat and humidity that these guys were racing in That will absolutely positively zap your energy it will zap your muscles it will zap every part of you as an interesting note Acosta actually had the bottle tube the bottle and the feed tube to his helmet and his in the hump on his back of his leathers So it means acosta was taking fluid on during the race or potentially taking fluid on during the race.

I did not see anybody else Have that particular bottle and Set up on their sit on their bikes Um, I thought that was very interesting that acosta had it but nobody else did Was it because he was able to hydrate some during the race? potentially Um, but I do think the heat and humidity play more into this than anything else. I think that it caused people to disrupt their tires on a track that they didn't have enough data on And I think that's where people just start to lose drive or lose fronts sasaki's front was gone with six to go I think a couple excuse me A couple of other people had tire issues whether they be rears and grip or fronts with the dunlaps and whatnot they the dunlap guys made some comment to To simon and I don't remember what it was. I didn't write it down for some odd reason, but they were They were shocked about how the tires were not giving out Or something. I don't remember.

I can't remember which way well, I think it was they were where they weren't giving up um I just think it's a new track which there is nuance to a track that you don't get you can practice it all you want but in a race there's going to be Spots that you find that you can go faster or you can go slower because you're going to see somebody else doing it And you you do it too, but I think it's more just the physical side Just the oppressive heat and humidity I think caused a lot of people just to like I can't do this I need to just ride home And not try to do anything. I guess an interesting indicator will be next year's race with you know Second time at the track with the year's data. Will that close the pack up in terms of bike settings and stuff? Oh then tires may because we know that little classes are gonna be a pirellies Yeah, I suppose it's a blank sheet of paper again in that respect isn't it next year with a completely different I don't have enough data on the pirellies to get there. But before we started chatting jim tonight or recording I should say you Noticed this thing with on pedro's bike going down the back straight, which oh, yeah The if you're going down the back straight away, they were all going Um to what would be screen left or riders, right?

And there's a little there's a hump In the straightaway there and right at the right at the like just before that hump Man, akasta's bike would just get a violent head shake I mean it was 180 miles an hour 190 miles an hour and that thing started to just wiggle itself And i'm like, why don't you take a different line? Why don't you move over a foot or two? But akasta never did it never bothered him, which is just I thought odd as well, but um It could have been a bike setup thing. It could be anything. It was just working everywhere else He was prepared to put up with that kind of negative aspects of it.

Yeah Everything about a setup in a motorcycle is a complete and total compromise You're never going to get it 100% Like I said rich, I think he just was i'm just gonna deal with this I'll loosen my grip push on the bars and ride through it. It's not a big deal. It's it's I know that sounds super counterintuitive, but that's what you do when you get a high-speed wobble like that you You loosen your grip and you push out On the bars, it's it solves it like well, that's like the last thing I wanted to do and You have to mentally tell yourself that you're going to do it because you just want to hang on for dear life It is a no, that's not what you'd actually do which is a bit bizarre Let's finish this guy off With a couple laps to go the roberts garcia battle was really interesting Roberts was riding one of his better races Uh of the year on the bike. He did eventually get by but then Garcia got back by again But then roberts got back by one last time by turning Inside of that bank turn eight nine area and holding an amazingly tight line Was able to get by and secure his spot on the podium The race finished with akasta winning by a country mile arbolino at second roberts on the podium and third I was glad to see him there then garcia gonzalez and vand gerberg Uh skinner was down at the last turn It was just a simple tuck of the front and uh with he then wound he wound up Being or who else was in that wreck? I might don't have it in my notes.

It was Because skinner went down and then was it? Oh, who was it? I cannot think of who it was rich. No, I can't remember that one Yeah, I can't remember that one who it was it was like One of the japanese riders and I can't think of who it was anyway Uh, they were he was a total victim of that crash just because there was no room for that there So that's the moto two race how it finished off there akasta pads his points lead over arbolino To 39 points Dixon has now third in the championship. He has 90 points off of the leader and he is 51 behind arbolino If dixon wants any piece of akasta, he's got to translate poles into victories And he cannot afford another low finish He has to stay with akasta if he wants to be a part of that championship I don't think third is sat shabby in this championship.

I'm all more power to dixon for being third love that He's got that right again for next year. So great things probably next year as well. Yeah, but Uh, you think that he's got to capitalize on what he's got when he's got it No, I mean things that is looking bleak for arbolino in second at 37 behind never mind where dixon's at in the championship So, I mean nobody You know god forbid akasta has an accident and breaks something or whatever, but that's really That's the only thing that could possibly I think, you know stop his march towards this title this year And he'll deserve it But you know, he has been hands down by a long distance the best rider in moto 2 in terms of consistency this year so Yeah, kind of hard to see any other result really isn't it? You know, i'm gonna fanboy on akasta here when he Was done and in part for may he just sort of looked like that was as fresh as a daisy He was just Not even whipped it was like yeah Cool that was only 12 laps. It was all right Where's the other eight?

No, I I'm not saying arbolino was was was beat down and beat down by the humidity and the heat right? But there was you could there was definitely a different look on his face compared to akasta's the only time i've ever seen this you know kind of a Difference And again, you're gonna hate it formula one analogy schumacher and malaysia the very first year with mika hawkinen in 99 you know, they're all the heat the humidity depressiveness blah blah blah blah schumacher popped out of that ferrari like he just Done three laps and parked it or something and hawkinen was spent on the podium It was impressive to see akasta be that way again If akasta was the only person taking on hydration because he had the water bottle hooked up in his leathers I think that was fair play right? Yeah, which goes to show the other guys what they need to do if they want to be on that so Jim can I just fanboy just fanboy for a minute? I'll pick this guy out several times this year, but I just absolutely outstanding sir. Joe garcia.

Yes, I agree You know, he's a rookie and Quite frankly, he's showing up his teammate arron connett Virtually every weekend now. Yeah, he has been retained in that team garcia that is for next year connett has not and Okay, he didn't quite make the podium but fourth place. I just thought he was brilliant all weekend, you know, and he's been Showing this kind of form as the years going on more and more and more and compare and contrast To his old teammate in moto 3 ethan gravara who we still haven't seen the transition to moto 2 yet Have we not to say it won't happen and i'm sure he will have a much better season next year But of the two you would have thought gravale would be the one that would Be the you know as the reigning moto 3 champion We expected him to be the one Up front and it's garcia's done an absolutely brilliant job I mean great result for roberts as well that was well deserved because he's had a pretty torrid year By and large, but yeah, no just shout out to sergio garcia You know, he'll be looking forward to next year. Yep. Great call on that one rich.

I agree with you. Um I've always rated garcia that little bit better than guvara and I That's me That's how I see them. Um again, there is plenty of time for guvara to figure it out Oh, yeah, and all that but yes a shout out to to To garcia for a great ride for that. All right last race of the day moto gp We haven't talked about the sprint. I know we got to qualify first and then we talk about sprinting.

Okay Yeah, I mean it's not a huge amount to talk about So Uh moto gp qualifying if I can find my moto gp qualifying notes here Oh, let's see So I think one of the big things is We had also not only was this race going to happen and we had sort of visa gate Which was not really visa gate But people were blown out of proportion is the fact that again mark marquez has become the master of social media Because here it was again. Well, all the rumor was still about him getting on a grissini ducati, which again that that seats open because we know that morbidelli officially said he was Going to be on the pre-mac bike. Yeah. So okay, that's grissini has the right to Hire marquez if they want to but it's just interesting how marquez has that power To dominate the social media scene just by random little pictures and thoughts. I mean there was so much made about the fact that him and his brother Walked the track together.

Oh look, they're going to be teammates again and blah blah blah You got to give you got to give the guy some credit to the mastery of keeping your name in the mix for things, right? So It looks like it's gonna happen though jimden I mean, I was actually sure it wasn't but if it's a enough sound as if it's gonna happen now We aren't gonna know until motegi because he's going to make an announcement now if you're gonna backstab honda Yeah, you are You couldn't pick you are definitely going to Rattle some cages if you announce at motegi. Yeah, i'm leaving You see holy hell I know there's a lot of theater around all this jim, but you know what I don't see that. There's any merit really now in terms of having a sit down with the big bosses at hrc because You know for years now honda said that they've you know got a new bike coming out Well, I knew this or I knew that and they keep ending up basically in the same position albeit they had a much better weekend this weekend, but Nothing that they say to mark marquez is going to suddenly make him think Oh, actually, no, I will stay because suddenly I believe again. I just don't think that's credible So and I although I find some of his behavior a bit difficult to stomach on occasion I don't think he's that vindictive to sort of stab them in the back at home at the home around So I wouldn't be surprised if we don't hear an announcement at motegi.

I think he's going to make his mind up at motegi but I would be Sort of betting that he probably makes an announcement At the following race or even a bit later in the year, but you know the whole Was it on sunday the interview that took place with paulo ciabatti? And this was the first time we'd heard anybody at giucati acknowledge the possibility That this could actually happen and I think that was a a very significant Development when that happened because up until now the narrative has been giucati are fussed about mark marquez. They don't particularly Want him on one of their bikes Well that that shifted over the weekend and so I think we can probably read quite a lot into that without being too conspiratorial now Yeah, like this one he literally could come out and manteague and say yeah i'm honoring my contract i'm writing next year There's nothing that's not says that he's not going to I do think that honda cannot get better until marquez leaves personal take the The divorce is going to happen whether it happens amicably or not is a different story That's where this one is Uh Yeah, I mean He could go to Grissini we know it's possible to win on a grissini bike. I give you passionini Well alex marquez won a sprint race for you. I like one on a sprint race, too So it's not improbable that you give him that bike and he has that talent that he's in the front but There's going to be If they if if he was going to go anywhere that would be the places his brother's there's his brother's used to his shit So basically it's not going to cause a problem, right?

Yeah, it's not going to there's not going to be a war of whatever in the paddock Although I think people are probably underestimating perhaps what alex marquez would really feel about mark turning up in that team Because he is going to overshadow him One way or another he just will because alex is a much steadier calmer kind of guy, isn't he? He's very very fast whether he's actually faster or slower than mark marquez. You know, he's hard to judge really but I don't really see that as a particularly Win-win situation for alex marquez if mark turns up there because he will definitely hog the limelight and he probably will be quicker As well, so it's a bit of a lose-lose. I think Yeah, but then it leaves but if he does leave it leaves honda an alert Because who they're going to put on the bike the bike has a I mean they've obviously paid through the nose To get zarko and zarko's input To make the bike better. Yeah.

Well, you could certainly see zarko moving Wearing orange and white. Yes, I fully see that too and I fully expect that in the likes of tony arbolino Certainly jake dixon's New moto 2 contracts next year There will be a trapdoor clause that says if a if a moto gp bike comes up and you know, the team wants one of them They're free to go. Yep. I wholly expect that to happen as well I mean you're dumb not to right but I mean It just I don't know. There's something odd here and I don't know what it is.

Right? I mean you can say I mean if he goes he goes I'm not Will know one way or the other. I mean if he goes and he wins the world championship on ducati he further submits his legend Right because he's done something that only lost in valentino And him have done well win a title on a different bike. I think agostini's in that list somewhere, too I there it's few far between of people who've changed bikes and have won a world another world championship So if he does great further submits the legend the guy's One of the best did you mention stoner? I forgot about stoner.

Sorry. Yeah, because he did win on The ducati one. Yeah, that's right. So so stoner loss and Mark if marquez can do it there then you have that I mean, it's it's very elite company. Let's just put it that way Yeah, well, it segues neatly jim into the qualifying doesn't it?

Because the hondas of the hondas suddenly Turned up at this race and there's obviously a reason for this Yes Let's talk about that just before we go to the race on sunday if you will first gp's first qp session bender Alex marquez oliver and miller are there so the ktms apparently do not like india at all because they were like The two best ktm writers, especially bender who's been on fire of late are nowhere to be found in that one Uh, it was a bit odd. In fact reloj fernandez and alex marquez are the two guys who get out of that session weird very but You're like, okay fine. So to make matters weirder is if you didn't think you stepped into the twilight zone marquez mark and mirror Are both automatically on the on straight into qp2 Again what happened to make the hondas suddenly quick and make mirrors suddenly like not try to crash his brains out with the thing Not sure what was going on there um elatius barguero Did not get the memo about the new start time for the qp2 session He was hot I mean he was pissed off he let Everybody in that pit know exactly what he thought about that one. He did pull the miyako, but yeah Should have done that shouldn't have yelled but I did well uh What do you make of that behavior though jim? I don't like that sort of thing at all this one I really don't get his I understand his anger, but the way he portrayed that anger was way out way out of line on this one And it reflects very badly on him as a person actually that kind of petulant, uh bullying Uh disrespectful, but I mean, I don't remember anybody in the team doing that last year in barcelona when alayce ballsed up and lost himself the race by Getting the time getting his timings wrong.

So, you know, it does cut both ways and you do sometimes feel that Well, we know that a lot of these riders turn into the most Appalling prima donnas, you know if they're allowed to Um, you know, they're big egos they're alphas, you know We get all of that But you really saw that come through in the worst possible way in that moment with elatius barguero and I like elatius barguero I mean People kind of like him because he wears his heart on his sleeve although he does he's so quick to start waving his fist at people and Shouting and bawling at people that have done nothing but support him and kept his career going when a lot of people would have dropped him I think was pretty pretty poor return really for the investment they put into him I don't disagree with you now alex marquez would fall at turn three Didn't appear to be that vicious of a crash But it was bad enough that he wound up breaking three ribs Yeah, I could only surmise him that he came down on the handlebar That's what I think happened too. I thought the same thing that he that he came down and clipped the handlebar or partially grazed the handlebar Which yeah rules him out of motegi as well. So he's not going to be there But bazeki would be on pole followed by martin I mean you beat the martinator at qualifying you're doing pretty good And then ben yayap, marini, mir and mark marquez starting in sixth For the sprint and the race that was an impressive qualifying by mark So we go to the sprint Everyone was on a medium front and a soft rear And the sprint started like two hours late as a result of the rain delays and other things that happened along the way Which did give us sort of a picturesque india with the sun setting and all that going on but luca marini Watched the first turn massively in there way too deep and clots his teammate And puts them both down now bazeki would remount and he would provide Literally the only excitement to the sprint race before his charge back up through but uh Martin would get out in front and there was nobody that was going to catch the martinator in the sprint race He was gone. There was really nothing happening ben yayap would ride him to second marquez would finish third to give him his second sprint podium and earn the bronze medal bender would ride up up to Fourth then bazeki would ride up to fifth Bazeki was so far behind everybody and was so fast. He rode past everybody to get to fifth in a 11 lap sprint and that was to me was The amazing part he was then followed home by quattro raro as well I thought if there's anything with two laps to go bazeki was sixth and then was fifth He raced all the way to that point.

I was Flabbergasted that bazeki had that kind of pace which made everybody stop and go. Whoa He was unlucky that the races had been shortened actually or the yes Because if he'd had that extra two or three laps or whatever it would have been probably one Marley certainly you'd have seen him on the podium Definitely definitely into fourth Yep, that was unlucky for him. Yes, so We get to sunday And simon is talking to some of the guys like lcr And it comes out That honda had a new frame And everyone but they can't run the new frame because the engines don't mount the same way in the frames now I think nakagami. I think mirror all liked the 2024 frame if you will the new frame They thought it was better in every area. That was a quote from juan mir Marquez apparently doesn't think so.

It's like same problem Okay. Well, then, you know, it's like I guess you're not there but now suddenly why is The honda's better all of a sudden. So According to what we found out from simon's interview with I think it was a luccianello, right? lcr he was talking to Or was he talking to one of the mechanics there? I can't remember.

Yeah. No, he definitely did talk to Try and get this right luchio That's it. Thank you. That's why you're here because you have names right now I don't but they were talking about how they had changed where the center of gravity was in the bike. They made it higher Okay.

Now wait a minute. This makes a huge amount of sense here when you stop and think about it again Story time with jim if you flash back to 1983 Spencer wins the world title on a three-cylinder honda the next year the honda engineers decide to make a v4 because freddy said We're not there's not enough power in the v3. Okay fine. They build this v4 What they do is they invert it they put the gas tank underneath it and the exhaust pipes exhaust pipes over the top They lowered the center of gravity of the motorcycle. It did not turn with a crap In fact, spencer spent most of the year riding the old three-cylinder honda at most tracks and the tracks that needed required a bunch Of power they'd roll the four-cylinder out.

The reason being is that motorcycles are a weird thing They're not like a car where he's lower the center of gravity and the faster a car will go around a corner Motorcycles their center of gravity is above the center line of the axles and depending on where that center of gravity is Above the center line of the axles the quicker the bike turns and responds It also has an ability like where that center of gravity is whether it's forward or backwards in the motorcycle Makes a big difference too Now think about this for a second you raise the center of gravity Now the bike changes directions a little bit quicker in the faster section than were technical sections notice that the hondas did turn quicker They were able to go through that section almost as fast as the ducatis I give you the fact that marquez was not really losing time to them in those in those sections Now if by doing that and they raise the center of gravity and they also happen to be where it moves the weight Backwards towards the rear the michelin rear is now going to be more effective It's going to want to stay on the track and help with the braking Which is the problem because the front can't handle the braking load that the bridgestones could And that's why you don't see the guys with the back ends up in the air that you do a little bit here and there But not to the immense prevalence see that you would see it For bridge in the bridgestone era, which means now you can use the rear brake to help your corner entry and slow yourself down Was that what they were missing the whole time? I highly doubt it. There's still other problems associated with it But for whatever reason that change seemed to have a world of difference I'd be very interested to see how this changed because you know, they're going to kind of stay with it How both mir and marquez do at motegi? We haven't really had an opportunity to see much of jamir on the honda this year other than when he's been picking himself up from yet another crash so Is this the mononabe effect? Do you think?

I'm just throwing it out there I I hadn't picked up on that interview that you alluded to where they were talking about this new frame and interesting That mark doesn't particularly care for it, but the others do Bear in mind what you just said that if mark marquez leaves, perhaps that is actually a net good thing for the longer term for honda anyway, I mean Jamir we got to see quite a bit of him this weekend now. He did crash out of the sprint Although it was more of a kind of low side thing I think but Certainly in the main on in this main race on sunday, you could see that it was you know, the bike is lively But he looked confident on it. Whereas when we have seen him Elsewhere this year He's looked really tentative because he knew he was going to crash at any moment Whereas he was really really pushing that honda and there was very little to separate him and marquez most of the weekend Really and that does bode well For honda I would suggest but Yeah, is it track specific or is it a bike change? I mean that we will find out a bit more This weekend amategi is is a completely different track and it is straights heartbreak in slow corners Accelerate So it's going to test the front end and any sort of rear stability rear braking assistance that they might be getting from this new geometry That should show itself I guess at japan, albeit it is a very very different track. So but will we see these Constant front enders that the hondas tend to suffer from because I mean again we haven't got to it yet But mark kind of dropped back massively after having a one of his famous near crashes in turn one didn't he so I think that was considered a full crash to be honest with you.

Well, yeah, it was um Yeah, um, it was typical mark marquez but Great if honda are making progress because boy do they need to Yeah, i'm again i'm wondering if this is wanton abi having had time with the bike and kind of work through setup has now Decided you're talking about you're talking about the kind of the clipboard. Yeah, can see the guy from zizuki I think his name is what another base rider. Oh Ouch wrong. There was a there was a rider called what an abi there's probably But I thought it was ken one. Oh my bad.

I'm sorry. Can you go? Koachi, I think Funny little sort of downturn man. He always looks upset doesn't he? Yeah, he does But hopefully it turned into a bit more of a smile on sunday.

Yeah, so I mean i'm like if this is him working through setups I you know again fresh eyes, right? I don't know whatever maybe this is maybe this was a bit of zizuki magic coming through Well, that's what i was thinking long last because we know that hrc are not exactly the first ones to jump at radical solutions Right, maybe they're just in such a hole now that they're allowing a bit more freedom And and if they fail they fail but if they succeed but okay, let's go this way then See, that's where I think you hit the nail on the head. We mirror look confident Which means the bike has to be more zizuki like Or certainly he's got feeling again. Yeah, exactly. I mean if you if Again if you're able to maximize the rear braking and you have stability that's not going everywhere and not everything's done on the front It's going to be better.

Anyway, I again, I don't know. Let's look at my tagging. Let's yeah We'll keep on talking about this. Yeah, we'll stay here forever. Yeah We learned sunday morning that marini would not race because he did have a fracture in his collarbone He came down brutally hard on his shoulder on his left shoulder I you know again You airbags are great and they do a lot to help but you can't prevent everything So he was on a plane back to have surgery in europe and so he's out for motegi but we'll rejoin for Um, what is after motegi is indonesia indonesia So he would be back for that one I don't know that who would go onto his bike as a replacement.

I suspect that bazzac you'll just run on his own for the Mini, I assume I assume that he will Yep. So again this race was shortened from the 24 laps I think to 21 laps Again because of the heat or whatever martin did get the whole shuffle by benya bazzaki marquez And mir they were all there Uh martin screws up a turn four and bazzaki and biagi go Yeah, biagi not biagi benya. I have biagi on the brain from the aprilia thing They go they go by at that point Bazzaki would then go to the front and that was the last anybody was going to see of Bazzaki bazzaki road off into the distance made it looks made everybody else look stupid and made this one look very easy If you'd have told me that vr 46 was going to win this many races this year I'd have laughed at you at the beginning of the season It has been a phenomenal thing that they have been able to do again when bez gets off the bike at the end of the race He looks very fresh and comfortable Meanwhile everybody else is fighting for everything all the scraps that are left Uh, you know alesh had some sort of a technical problem. I think the gearbox quit working on him or locked up in gear Maybe locked up in second They had there by 10 laps to go bazzaki had four seconds lead over martin benya Quattroraro who had a very good time In between this marquez had crashed He basically was trying to save it on the elbow at the first turn Didn't work and he just simply stayed underneath of the bike to keep it running so that he could pick it back up And keep going which he did quattroraro was looking menacing I would say the best we've seen out of quattrora on the amaha. Why this track?

I cannot ask. I mean, maybe there's some stability because of the Turn eight nine and some of the flicks. Maybe the bike's just nimble enough that he can keep on the gas and get through those Get through those flicks Benya would get by martin for a little bit eight nine and then promptly benya tossed it away at turn five Where have we seen this before? This is typical benya end of year form We're going to toss it away a couple of times and throw away points and sure victories Really weird that he threw it away like he did but it gave quattroraro a chance to be on the podium Because he was now risen to Third mirror was fifth or sorry was fourth. Sorry then bender and zarko Now martin's leathers opened up with six laps to go And they were open for about a lap lap and a half and then martin was able to actually zip them back up That cost him a huge amount of time And put quattroraro Literally right on his tail Now when that happened martin sort of tried to get himself collect himself get back together again meanwhile, you know, bazeki's gone He has done won the race.

Okay Quattroraro then had a ding-dong with martin where he then passed martin and martin on the last lap Ran wide At turn four which allowed quattroraro to get past Martin then gathered himself back up Chopped the nose off of martin going through I think like five or six Then they went through the big the big bank turn and martin would hang on and go to second so the finishing order the finishing order of that one was uh Let me see. Where did this how did the order run down here? I know we had bazeki martin quattroraro bender would be fourth then mirror then zarko Morbidele vignoles marquez would get back to ninth and then raul fernandez in tenth But there's more interesting things to happen here martin stops in his pit box Gets off of his bike and just doused with water. He completely Was completely spent like you looked into the eyes of a man who was lost He definitely was not there. These guys are incredibly fit athletes and martin was hurting Bad he did manage to walk himself down to the park for may he was drinking more water and then he next thing you know, he's Sitting down again and the medical team is looking at him apparently he had suffered dehydration Which if you've ever been severely dehydrated your mind doesn't function your body doesn't want to work, right?

And you're having fits to try to do anything let alone race A 300 horsepower motorcycle at over 200 miles an hour around a very complicated track with quattroraro right behind you trying to steal A podium position away from you. Okay, all credit to martin for being balls out. But one of the things that he did That I thought was really interesting was his chugging of his red bull at the end of the race You're dehydrated Sucking down a caffeine drink which will do nothing more than dehydrate you more When you should have basically been sucking down water now I did ask my wife who was a doctor if that was a smart thing to do to drink caffeine drinks She said no caffeine will dehydrate you even more than you are And given the amount of caffeine that's in a red bull that was probably not the right thing to actually do In fact, it was so bad that martin didn't was relieved of all of his post podium Duties and was able to seek the medical treatment he need to be rehydrated Be interesting to see how he is in five days time when they get to mategi But that is how things ended up in a very bizarre hot humid india rich Yeah ending to a very strange race, right it was an odd race Yeah It wasn't a particularly exciting race in the sense that there wasn't much racing and overtaking going on and we can park You know discussion as to Aero and one thing and another being a part of part of that problem. Not the entirety of the problem But I mean the big talking point of the race was banyan crashing out The second place chasing a guy he had no hope of catching I mean that is a terrible lapse of judgment really on his part and and is Kind of indicative of what you tend to see from banyan from time to time now I was listening to somebody else A day or two ago that was commenting on the race weekend and There was a lot apparently and obviously I wasn't there There was a lot of talk and a lot of worry in the works. Ducati squad on the saturday night About bazzeki's pace in the sprint because although we only finished what did he end up jim fifth?

His lap times had everybody worried And now whether that got into some of the riders heads a little bit Um banyan, we sort of always worry that he can be a little bit Apt to these sort of lapses of concentration or whatever And this is this is not a kind of a criticism as such because as you just said the racing At this place of all places in that heat that humidity on those bikes It's a momentary thing and you're down. So it can be really criticizing. No, but he does do this quite often And I mean he should have just banked the 20 points Rather than trying to chase after bazzeki. He just was not going to count. Yeah catch but Maybe those lap times have just got into his head a little bit and I don't know it's hard to know really why That crash happened under the circumstances because he's now as we're going to talk about in a minute In a bit of jeopardy in the point situation if he doesn't get himself straightened out fairly quickly and obviously we're going straight to the Japanese grand prix a few days later So he doesn't have a lot of time to sort of pause for thought He's not going to get time to go home and sit by the pool and just you know, chill out for a bit It'll be on media duties already.

I expect so they don't get any rest Um on the back of a draining weekend plus a crash that he shouldn't have had We need to watch what banyan gets up to this weekend because he if he If he comes out and has a solid weekend, even if he doesn't win, but if he gets a decent podium In both of the races that'll be job done for banyan because at this point he just needs to steady the hell down Otherwise you could see a You know, could we could this be the first year that a non works bike wins? I mean Okay, is it but it is a well bike. It is it is a works bike, but it's a privateer team So that's the distinction here But I mean I think it's worth saying at this point that all of these bikes are so close and so good The I think the days where you'd say well a Yeah, a customer bike could never win a championship. They're not they're not customer bikes anymore Are they I mean just look at bazzaki. I mean that things are you you know, that's last year's bike Not gonna be it's the best one out there now.

So Yeah, so the banyan thing was kind of huge really. Um, yeah, it hurt him because in the points his lead shifts to 13 13 points ahead of martin Not comfortable no And don't forget jim because banyan is the champion and he's the works rider Whereas the other two I mean bazzaki is not out of this either yet, but but here's a fair bit further back But because the other two Are not on the works bike. Let's say the red bikes There's much much less pressure on them because nobody expects them to win because it would be unprecedented if one of them did So all of the pressure is on banyan. It is It's an uncomfortable place for him to be but you know Only a certain amount of sympathy because he's getting paid quite well to do this job. So But yeah, gonna be interesting to see how he copes with the pressures of it all this weekend Yep, bazzaki is 44 points behind and third bender is 100 behind 100 points behind and fourth it's a three horse race and Uh banyan better get it right better right the ship and ride it very quickly because if he doesn't Martin will win this championship Which last year in japan when banyan and kawatora were kind of locked in a battle for the championship one of them Did a stupid last lap or penultimate lap dive up the inside and went down now was that kawatora or was that banyan?

I've been trying to remember all day Because mateke is one of those unfortunate tracks that invites a late lunch because it's all about the brakes there Especially on that downhill was to go back in underneath the over the bridge. Yeah I need to i'll have to refresh my memory on that i think it was kawatora that boggled there because banyan then crashed at sapang and turned one Because he was down there I know he was on the ground in in in in malaysia a week later So it was sort of that tit for tat like I screwed up now you screwed up thing. I I believe I was trying to remember if banyan goes into this weekend having crashed there needlessly last year, but I So maybe it wasn't banyan. I don't need to go back. I do kind of now Did you like run off of the chicane at the end or make some weird somebody tweet tweet us with the answer on this one For god's sake put us out of our misery right now.

Somebody said right now somebody's screaming at their podcast device going No, you idiots. It was that 51 year old memory is failing again. It's failing again Because Oh, so that is how this crazy weekend in india left. We've got a short four days now for everybody to reconvene in Japan and we shall see have all these questions will soon be answered one. I think question one is martin Fully healthy rehydrated refluid and ready to go again Two is banyan gonna put this behind him or is he gonna let it linger to have another silly problem again?

Before are the hones gonna run well again or is this an anomaly just because of the track that they were at A lot to think about there. So i'm all for this. I can't wait And I don't think we actually you just saying that jim. I don't think we should underestimate How much pressure is on martin physically on this one because he was in quite bad shape, wouldn't they From from what we saw and and that will take a bit of getting over because I mean that is Physically very very draining to be in that position. I'm sure and again Because it's such a quick turnaround to get to japan and they'll be on duty I mean, maybe he'll be relieved of some of the media stuff to help him out.

But Yeah, it's unfortunate timing for him. He has to go straight to a back-to-back race We can so i'm not saying that's a let off the banyan because he's got his own issues to deal with We've just been talking about but it's an open door for bazeki Some of this stuff if if martin and or banyan have a bit of an off weekend for one reason or another Bazeki on this sort of form Is it could could close that gap down quite quickly? Agreed what do you say was 44 points? I mean, it's quite a big guess Like big four behind but you know what you've got races and stuff in there exactly Anything crazy can happen in a weekend to win in moto gp now with the sprint and the main race So, you know if banyan or martin have an off weekend or crash in one of the races or both I haven't forbid then you know bazzaki is right back in it all of a sudden So there's a long way to go in this championship and it didn't look that way four or five races ago I mean banyan was miles out front So he's squandered a big lead Yep, I agree. Um, I think martin is more than likely to do another double somewhere here and he's in the next set of races I um The the last two call uh catar under the lights and then valencia are going to be interested just because of the sprint race being in it Right and the extra yeah 12 points to win there.

It's gonna the mathematics are are changing The I just gotta say the biggest the biggest disaster of the weekend jim was my fantasy league because I forgot to take danny pedrosa out after mizano I got completely caught out by the time zone by the time I realized I couldn't change it Yeah, what is the difference is Two and a half hours ahead for Japan They're two and a half hours ahead of india, which is not too bad for jet lag a couple hours is not horrible For these guys, but they're the masters of getting over jet lag and and everything else. So Anyway with that we will say our goodbyes. I'm going to remind you all to ride safe See you in a week