Jorge Martin was the star of the Buriram weekend, placing a heavy one-two in the title race. If yesterday he suffered, finishing only seventh in the Sprint, in the long race he managed to limit the damage, conceding only 5 points to his rival. It’s true that he finished third under the checkered flag, but a penalty given to Brad Binder for putting the tires of his KTM on green on the last lap allowed him to move up to second place.
Even today, however, the reigning world champion made his life difficult in the very early stages of the race. Starting from the second row, he found himself embroiled in the brawl and at one point he was sixth again. With the long race, however, he had more time to recover and get back into the leading group, even if he had to give up tire management and this affected him in the final.
“I was very happy, because I started well and immediately placed myself in fourth. I thought I could manage the tire and do everything well, then ‘bam’, a crash came. The next lap ‘bam’, another one. It’s It was objectively a very fun race, because then I was going fast, so I was also able to overtake. Today, however, the wear of the rear tire was something that I had to put aside, because I had to recover”, Bagnaia told Sky Sport MotoGP .
“Unfortunately I wasn’t incisive in the main accelerations, exiting the last corner, from 1 and 3, so I lacked a bit of inspiration. But recovering and finishing second, with Binder touching the green, is an excellent result , also considering that it was a very beautiful race. Perhaps one of the most beautiful of this year. It’s just a shame not to have made the last overtaking move on the penultimate lap. That was… You can’t say (laughs)”, he added.
The last mention was of a double overtaking on the outside of the last corner to the detriment of both Martin and Binder who had almost succeeded with one lap to go: “I don’t know what the other two did, but fortunately I was at ‘outside, otherwise I would have hit them squarely. They braked really early and I found myself first. I tried to brake very hard, but when you’re on the outside you know that a crash can come and it has arrived.”
Photo by: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
Francesco Bagnaia, Ducati Team
According to Pecco, however, the key that allowed Martin to triumph again today was tire management. Having to remount, and also being careful not to let the front tire heat up too much, the Ducati rider no longer had too many weapons for the final duel.
“I tried to never stay in the slipstream, because the temperature and pressure of the front tire were really high, so the less time you spent with a bike in front the better. I did the whole race with someone in front and it was tough on the front, but mainly it was the deterioration of the rear tire that didn’t allow me to have the first starting point. Martin on the other hand, leading the whole race, managed to have a small advantage and was stronger in that.”
Making a comparison between himself and his Prima Pramac Racing rival, the Piedmontese underlined that if it is true that the Madrilenian seems to have an edge from the outside, in the end on Sunday the two are always very close, so the biggest difference is the way they come to construct their race.
“Objectively, when you look at our weekends, Jorge is more impressive because he has truly incredible consistency and explosiveness. We, on the other hand, work much more in the shadows, then in the end the performances are quite equal in the race. What we we have to improve, what we lacked this weekend, is the explosiveness with the soft tyre. We lost a bit there, because we were going really fast and both yesterday and today, starting further forward, we could have done two different races.”
Qualifying, however, is not an absolute problem, it was especially so in Thailand: “In reality this year I have like 76 points ahead of the second in the pole rankings. We have always been fast in qualifying in all conditions, more than anything else. very consistent. This weekend, however, I struggled a lot with the tyres: having them so different in terms of feeling affected me a lot in pushing myself to the limit and it was a great shame, because we have had a great pace all weekend. It could have been one of those races where I could put myself 6-7 tenths ahead and maintain it. But it went the way it went and in the end we have to take away today’s good.”
When, after the press conference, he was asked to draw up a final assessment of the weekend, which ended with a 13 point advantage over Martin, he said: “Yesterday we lost too many points compared to what our potential was, but let’s go away from this Asian hat-trick with a margin of 10 points more than when we started, so we have to be optimistic. Then we also got the speed back and this is fundamental.”
“I think Jorge doesn’t need energy, because he’s already full of energy, even if the victories help the riders to find confidence a lot. But this time we were there, so I’m very happy because we returned to a weekend at the highest level which we’ve been missing it for a while,” he concluded.
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