Jerez, Marquez to Bagnaia: “No penalties, like in Portimão…”

Sprint Jerez, Marquez stings Bagnaia

Also in the Sprint of the Spanish Grand Prix, as in Austin, Marc Marquez he crashed immediately after taking the lead. The eight-time world champion, after taking advantage of a slip by Jorge Martin, slipped in turn 13 and lost the lead in the short race: good at getting up, the Cabroncito he then became the protagonist of a furious comeback. Even too furious, considering the risky attempt to overtake Joan Mir which cost him a position on the track (later recovered with interest).

In the end, considering Francesco Bagnaia's zero due to the contact with Brad Binder, the many crashes and the penalty given to Raul Fernandez which gave him 6th place, Marquez managed to limit the damage. After the Sprint, in fact, the Spaniard seemed happy with his Saturday and precisely because of the contact with Binder (judged as a race accident) he pinched Bagnaia, with whom he had come into contact in Portimão.

Marquez's words

“It was a braking like the one Binder did to me. I opened and went wide, I miscalculated and we had contact, like Binder with Bagnaia at the first corner. I took the one position penalty and I completely agree: I gave the position to Oliveira and then passed him again later“, this is the comment to Sky Sports MotoGP. “Too much aggression in the Sprint? It's always been like this. Last year almost all the falls and contacts were in the Sprint. On Saturday everyone runs worse, because you have fewer laps. The stewards were good today: I took the penalty with Mir and it was right, I made a mistake. The Bagnaia-Binder contact? Difficult to evaluate, but if nothing was done in Portimão nothing should have been done here today“.

“I'm happy. Every time we are close to making something happen, but for the moment I fall. The fall is an error of ten centimeters, like 50% of pilots today: you took a drop of water and went to the ground“, has continued.

“I finally have a 'plan' and this plan is moving forward. We started in Qatar, then Portimão, then in Austin we took a step forward in terms of intensity, and when you do that you take more risks. But now the speed is there. I have to work on managing all the moments well now. We did the difficult things right and the easier things wrong. The plan before was mine alone and it was to get out of the negative spiral. It wasn't easy but I'm managing it: I had two quiet weekends in Lusail and Portimão, and then pushed harder in Austin and here. But we found something in Austin on a technical level, we changed the bike and I feel better. Before I didn't want to change the bike too much and I wanted to understand how to ride. The crew chief understood what I was missing, we did better in Austin and now here too. But we are still missing something“.