MotoGP | Martin: “Inconsistent Race Direction, has set a precedent”

Misano has a bittersweet taste for Jorge Martin, who also closes the second appointment in Romagna as the world championship leader with an increased advantage. However, he flies to Asia with a fast of victories that has lasted since May, when he triumphed at Le Mans. What seemed to be the first success in four months, vanished on the last lap: the one who ruined the party of the Pramac rider was Enea Bastianini, author of a controversial overtaking that deprived the Spaniard of the top step of the podium.

On a Sunday that has two faces, Martin finds himself having to argue with Race Direction, guilty according to him of not having uniformity of judgment. Bastianini’s overtaking of him was, in his opinion, aggressive. But the point is that the rider from Rimini went off the track, therefore he should give up a position, according to Martin’s logic: “The maneuver was very similar to Marc’s, his reaction surprised me. I think there is no consistency in Race Direction. There was contact and it is part of our sport, but if the rider who is overtaking goes off the track, then he must give up the position. I was lucky not to fall, I could have missed this opportunity, but I will keep the positive things from the weekend”.

“I don’t consider myself a driver who seeks contact, but if in some situation I have to do it, Race Direction won’t be able to do anything,” Martin said at the end of the race. “It’s a weapon that I keep in my pocket, I don’t think I’ll use it and I hope it won’t be needed. But it’s clear that if there wasn’t a penalty today, there shouldn’t be a next time if I do it. Now we have a precedent.”

The victory did not come, but Pecco Bagnaia’s fall when he was third paved the way for the rider from Madrid, who now arrives in Indonesia with a 24-point advantage in the general classification: “I think it weighs more to have obtained the points than to have lost the race. In the heat of the moment, I wanted the victory. But if Pecco had been in Enea’s place, now we would only be talking about a 9-point advantage. So this situation is better, obviously. Above all, I was stronger than him on the track, this is important. I had the chance to win and I’m happy with the result.”

After crossing the finish line, Martin made the umbrella gesture, but already on the re-entry lap he approached Bastianini to shake his hand. A fair play gesture from the world championship leader, who already seems to have put the incident behind him: “Maybe another rider wouldn’t have shaken his hand until the next race, but in the end I worked a lot on the ego that I don’t have. I congratulated him on the victory and I look forward.”

“If it had happened to me last year or two years ago, the parc fermé would have been a different situation. But ego gets you nowhere, you have to stay calm and be aware of what can happen. I look at the positive things, how to improve and how to stay focused on the final goal, and arguing after the races is not one of those things,” Martin admits.

In a year, the Pramac rider has matured, demonstrating that he has more clarity in dealing with situations that in the past had affected him so much that he lost the world championship. Now, however, we see a more thoughtful, but also more calculating Martin: “Before seeing Pecco out, I saw his helmet on the big screen. In that moment, a lot of things go through your head, especially the fact that you have to get to the finish line. If I wasn’t in the fight for the world championship, there would have been a different ending. Either we ended up on the ground or I won. In this situation, I felt the contact, I went out and it ended there”.

“The dream situation would be to arrive with 80 points and move ahead like David Alonso, but this is the reality. In the end I want to focus on my driving. Today during the race I was losing concentration a bit watching the big screen, but when I am fully concentrated it is impossible to overtake me and we saw it,” he concludes.