After the emotional blow of being left without a place in the official Ducati team for 2025, Jorge Martin has lost some of his bearings in the MotoGP World Championship, although he has managed to straighten out his position. However, five wins in the last six races for Pecco Bagnaia indicate a slight gap in favor of the reigning world champion.
After two second places at Silverstone and Austria, Martin arrives at one of his home races confident that he can make up ground.
“We come here a bit like always, to keep giving gas. Definitely. The goal is to keep improving and growing, and I think I’ve done that in the last races. I miss a bit the feeling with the front of the bike that Pecco has, he has a bit more than me. But I hope to find it here,” he said.
Unlike Bagnaia, Enea Bastianini and Marc Marquez, his closest rivals, Martin has never won in MotoGP at Motorland, but he has won in Moto3.
“It’s a victory I’ve been missing and I hope to get it this weekend,” he admitted.
“Aragon is a circuit where there are many points to overtake but it is not so easy to do it. We can see from other years that it is easy to go long. It is a very wide track and this favors overtaking because when you go wide you leave the door open. It is important to be fast from the beginning and have a good pace, try to get to the front and avoid overtaking,” said the Prima Pramac Racing rider.
This season, races are decided early on, and whoever finishes in front ends up winning most of the time.
“It depends on the circuit, I would say that in Austria 90% of the race is already won if you are in front at the start, here in Aragón I would put it at 50%, you have half the race won, but you still have a lot of work to do. It is one of the tracks where you can recover the most and even if you start badly or back on the grid, you still have a chance to win. Basically, because there are many corners, more places to recover, a long track…”.
Jorge Martin, Pramac Racing
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
The differences with Bagnaia
In Austria Martin said that Bagnaia did not have more than him, the difference was that the Italian remained at the same level throughout the race, while Martin dropped slightly in the final. It was probably the result of following another bike, warming up the tires and increasing the pressure.
“In Austria it was very hot and when you are behind another bike everything heats up. The truth is that I felt quite comfortable behind, until at a certain point I stopped riding comfortably, I risked falling at every corner. It depends on the temperature, here the problem might not be so intense, but it will be there. It is important to be in the lead or leave space for those in front and have a good strategy. In Austria, staying close to them was not the best strategy”, he admitted.
At this point and with the Spaniard’s assessments, one might think that the best tactic to win is to get in front and push. “Sometimes it’s better to stay behind, as happened at Silverstone or Le Mans. You have to plan your race strategy based on the temperature.”
On where this slight difference lies and how to bridge it, Martin explained his point of view.
“There are several points where he is stronger than me. He is not stronger, but I am the one who can still improve a little: one is braking. He is stronger than me there, I am working on it, in the last two races I have not done very well, but we are working to improve. The other point is that when I am behind another rider I suffer a lot: you can see Marc Marquez, Pecco or Enea Bastianini who if they are behind do not suffer so much. But for me it is difficult, I do not know if it is because of braking or the lines, I cannot follow them for many laps and I go faster when I am in the lead. So I have to work on this aspect”, he said.
At the moment, both Pecco and Jorge are at an extraordinary level of riding, and the Spaniard was asked if this was compatible with having fun on the bike.
“It’s not about having fun, but knowing how to enjoy the suffering. It’s part of the process, enjoying how much you suffer to reach this level, giving one hundred percent. A few years ago you could say ‘go on the track and have fun’, but when you’re giving one hundred percent and your heart rate is at 200, the least you can do is have fun, you’re suffering. But in the end you enjoy that moment,” he confessed. “In the end we enjoy the sport, the victory, the pole position, but in the meantime there is suffering, you have to work on it.”
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