Jack Miller (Ducati) took a dominant win at Motegi earlier today. Miller passed several riders during the first few laps and then pulled away to a big gap. Behind him, Brad Binder (KTM) was able to pass Jorge Martin (Ducati) near the end of the race to take second place, with Martin finishing third.
The three championship contenders each had disappointing days in their own ways. Aleix Espargaró had a problem with his bike on the warm-up lap which forced him to start from pit lane on his spare bike. Espargaro was not able to finish high enough to earn any points. Meanwhile, Pecco Bagnaia (Ducati) had trouble moving up from his poor grid position and crashed on the last lap while running in the ninth position.
Fabio Quartararo (Yamaha) did finish the race today, but could only finish in eighth place. Nevertheless, he has extended his points lead in the championship, which now stands at 18 points over Pecco Bagnaia.
For full results of today’s race, take a look here. You can find additional details on the MotoGP site.
I thought one of the best rides of the day was by Marquez. He rode a measured, smart race from pole, showing speed and maturity. Here’s hoping he keeps that up. If so, I’ve no doubt he will soon be winning races again, and very soon.
What a ride by Jack “thriller Miller ” coming from 7 th on the grid and just move through the pack with well executed & clean passes & Brad Binders pass up the inside of Jorg Martin on the last lap was incredible ,didnt think he was going to pull it off ,I hope this skill cont for both riders into 2023 & KTM work hard in the off season to give Jack & Brad a competetive bike to fight for the championship. Marquez rode the correct race with the soft rear tyre although didn’t get off to a good start & didn’t try and go all in at the end which could have ended up in the gravel ,liked his pass on Oliveira .Together with a 100 % fit Marquez & improved 2023 Honda which hopefully Joan Mir can figure out early & show his true potential will make 2023 really intrstg,Also with Aleix & Maverick “top gun ” with a dialled in Aprillia & the newly formed Aprillia Tech 3 team & not forgetting Fabio & Mobidelli ?????,what’s up with this guy ,on the supposedly faster 2023 Yammy can start putting a dent in the Ducati dominance which we have seen most year.
Yep, I have some hope that the 2023 season is going to be pretty interesting.
Okay, which one of you jokers is trolling as “john”? It’s hilarious!
Binder shows up on Sundays- huge respect.
Why no coverage of MXDN?
Miller rode superbly. I was expecting him to crash out for most of the race lol. Bagnaia really blew it and almost took out Quatro in the process. I didn’t quite understand the clapping and stuff when he got up, like he was celebrating the crash?
Quatararo hung in there just enough, while his main competitors failed to take advantage. Bet he can’t wait for 2023 power.
I felt bad for A Espargaro having bike issues on the warm up lap. The video of everyone blowing by him and him dropping his head on his gas tank was just heartbreaking. I have a feeling this year is his best and only chance at taking the championship.
“I didn’t quite understand the clapping and stuff when he got up, like he was celebrating the crash?”
You obviously didn’t understand.
I’m sure pecco’s team were “popping the corks” when they saw pecco go into the gravel. perfect execution of master strategy.
OMG what the heck are people sniffing in the mornings these days???!!!
He’s quoted elsewhere about it. It was sarcasm, basically calling himself a dummy for making a big mistake. He seemed genuinely concerned that he didn’t harm Fabio’s race, which was nice to see.
Thanks Dave. Just watched the interview over on MotoGP.com where the interviewer wondered the same thing and asked him about it.
Pecco seems to be a nice kid, like Danny Pedrosa was. More concerned about the other guy than the personal ramifications.
I’ve never seen a ride from Miller like that before. Like you I was waiting for him to chuck it into the gravel or run out of tire with 6 laps to go, but he pulled off a masterpiece of a race.
One of Aleix’s techs forgot to take the bike off of the sighting lap mapping which limits the bike to 100kmph. What a shame.
well well…MM did very well for his first race back, in how long, when some dummy isn’t smashing into him.
and…what…nobody is calling pecco’s attempted murder on fabio??? oh my how things change?
–“Worst track of the year for the Yamaha, and possibly the best for Ducati, and still Fabio extended his lead.”
OMG…yes. fabio managed 8th WOW!!! what a true champ. not a choke whatsoever. being absolutely spanked by an old hasbeen ex-champ (at his first race in years) both on qualifying and race day…nothing to be shamed about at all…hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!!!!
–“Ahhh, Peco. You blew it man. He’s still very much in the running, but that’s a lot of points to spot Quartararo, and just by being stupid”
OMG…yes. pecco is obviously sooooo stupid isn’t he. it’s like…wow…why do so many race teams always pick such stupid people to operate their equipment?!?! Jeremy should ride Ducati’s bike because he sounds soooo smart.
I mean it is obvious that Pecco attempted murder on fabio because Pecco lost traction at a spot where nobody else did…soooooo…that’s attempted murder right?!??! t
hat’s what MM did, lose traction where others did not, and everyone called him out for attempted murder.
what is going here? have we all become much more enlightened in a week or much more forgiving or what?
Pecco went for an impossible lunge on Fabio during the last lap which, even if it would have been possible, would have earned him one whole point. He could have waited two turns and probably just gobbled Fabio up on the gas out of the slow 1st gear turn where all the Yamahas were struggling. Or he could have just collected the points he had in the bag and kept the championship tight. So yes, it was a stupid move in the heat of the moment. I never said Pecco was a stupid person, though I can see where a young kid or some total ignoramus might infer that from what I said. It was just an “obviously” stupid moment for Pecco, just like this is an obviously stupid moment for you. That doesn’t mean I think Pecco is stupid any more than I think you are stupid, though I get the feeling you might try hard to convince me otherwise on that last point.
Fabio managed 8th when his two chief rivals managed zero points and no other Yamaha finished even close to him. Maybe that isn’t “WOW!!!” factor stuff, but it is a pretty good day at the office.
“Ahhh, Peco. You blew it man. He’s still very much in the running, but that’s a lot of points to spot Quartararo, and just by being stupid”
””I never said Pecco was a stupid person””
yes you did…right here below
“and just by being stupid”
do you not rememnber your own words?
“though I can see where a young kid or some total ignoramus might infer that from what I said”
no inference required and no guess work there either kid…you did what you did and now you are attempting to back pedal for some lame reason. an action one would expect from a class leading ignoramous.
i’ll raise your ‘i’m right and you are wrong if you respond to my post then you are a ‘insert insults and name calling’ kid.
if you respond to anything i staye then you are immedaitely guilty of any charge I proclaim.
I find it very disturbing that Ducati and the press seem to think “team orders” can and should be issued to all 7 Ducati riders in an effort to help Pecco win the championship. Team orders can only be issued to riders on the same team. In Ducati Lenovo’s case, that means Jack Miller only. Asking any other of the 6 Ducati riders for help is not team orders but MANUFACTURER ORDERS. See where I’m going with this??? If Davide, Paolo, Claudio or Gigi say anything to the Gresini, Pramac or VR 46 teams about how their riders should approach a race, then the championship is now a sham. The other teams just happen to be riding Ducatis, they are under no obligation to listen to what Ducati Lenovo upper management has to say about anything. If this isn’t true, the you have a situation where a full third of the field can be told to pull over and let Pecco past. If this truly is the case then I will not be watching MotoGP after this season. Because it won’t be a championship, it will be a series run by Italian puppet masters. If you look at Enea’s lap times during the race , you can see he was a full 0.6 seconds slower than his normal laptime ONLY on the lap that Pecco passed him. Oddly enough, his laptimes after that pass pretty much mirrored Pecco’s. I am convinced Enea was told to let Pecco by and then explain it away as a front tire pressure issue in the post race interviews. La BESTIA is caught between a rock and a hard place with Lenovo since he will be their employee next season. Shouldn’t Enea be allowed to ride his own race and try to catch Aleix for third overall in the championship??? If the answer is no then I will be watching World Superbike next season. “Peace out” as the late great N. Hayden would say.
I honestly don’t think Bastianini takes orders, whether they’ve been handed down or not. He has his factory contract now, and I think he is perfectly happy to get an early start trying to show Pecco who is going to be Numero Uno in that garage next year. If Pecco wins the championship he’ll pretty much become royalty at Ducati, and I don’t think Enea likes that idea at all. Enea wants to be the first rider since Stoner to bring that honor home. There are also huge monetary bonuses for riders and team members to win races and finish in the top three positions of the championship, objectives well within his reach. He has no good reason to back off. He’s set for next year, and there is still glory and treasure to be had this year. Unless Ducati is writing checks to him and his team to back off, I don’t see it happening.
From what I’ve seen of his personality, he doesn’t even care if he pisses Ducati off. In his mind, he is going to dominate Pecco next year and force Ducati to align with him regardless of how they feel about his antics this season. The guy is bold, no doubt. We’ll see how that plays out next year.
I sincerely hope you are right. La BESTIA is my favorite rider in MotoGP. It took me a few years to find a new guy after Lorenzo retired. Watching Enea last year on that POS ‘19 Ducati sealed the deal for me. That bike was constantly pumping so hard on the rear suspension I thought it was just gonna spit him off. But he never backed off the throttle. My kinda guy. I still am extremely suspicious of the upper level Ducati guys. First, they seem to have no organizational hierarchy and just wander from rider to rider (even non-Lenovo riders) alternately hugging them or scolding them. Witness Tardozzi’s comments to Enea following his Aragon win about “rapping his knuckles with a ruler” following his last lap pass of Pecco. I love Ducati bikes in general and have some very dear Italian friends who are some of the best people I have ever met. I just get this weird vibe from the Lenovo rulers that they are willing to do anything, ethical or not, to have an Italian rider win the championship on a Ducati. Again, I hope I’m wrong. But World Superbike looks increasingly appealing now that all the riders hate each other ala Lorenzo, Pedrosa, Rossi, Stoner and Marquez in the old days.
He’s intense but I haven’t seen much to make me believe he’d cross a line.
Funny how we’re already starting to think about next year. A quick look at the points spread in the top-4 tells me that there’s still a lot to see this year. The top two’s retirements in the last two races have really tightened things up.
Ahhh, Peco. You blew it man. He’s still very much in the running, but that’s a lot of points to spot Quartararo, and just by being stupid.
Binder ran a great race. I wish I could see him on a good package, or maybe I wish for KTM to really figure out their package. It was always a treat to watch Binder in Moto3 and Moto2. He deserves a weapon he can really fight with.
Marquez surprised me all weekend. His pace and pole lap in the wet and P4 in the dry race were much better results than I expected. I’m sure he was suffering physically, but frankly watching him literally wiggle the Honda around that track lap after lap, the bike definitely seemed like the limiting factor in that equation. That thing just isn’t stable anywhere. Braking, corner entry, mid-corner, corner exit… The bike truly has no strong points. How did a company like Honda get so lost?
Props to Miller who had it dialed in like no one else.
Miller finally had all stars align and made it the cleanest race yet. This season isn’t over yet and Ducati, KYM, and Aprilia have stunned the likes of Honda and Yamaha. Marvquez certainly is on form this early in his return. Brad Binder proved beyond a doubt his talent. The mid field battled for points throughout the race. Excellent efforts all around. Hope the decision for champ is only decided after the final race.
That Ducati almost looks pretty good if you can’t see the Batmobile fins
Worst track of the year for the Yamaha, and possibly the best for Ducati, and still Fabio extended his lead.
For Fabio to win this thing, it’s going to have to be more of a Stalingrad or Battle of the Somme than any sort of Desert Storm. Survive the horror, thank the gods that you’re still able to fight another day, and keep moving.
As Ricky Carmichael astutely says, “you win championships on your bad days”. On the day when everyone struggled, Fabio extracted something of value when his rivals could not.