MotoGP | Martin: “There are no excuses, I have to change my mentality”

Two second places are not the end of the world, but it was impossible not to read the disappointment on Jorge Martin’s face at the end of the Red Bull Ring weekend. The Prima Pramac Racing rider had regained the lead in the world championship standings two weeks ago at Silverstone, but in Austria he had to deal with a Pecco Bagnaia in great form, who with a beautiful double once again overtook him by 5 points in the race for the 2024 MotoGP title.

Despite a thumb with two stitches, “Martinator” managed to sign a sensational pole position on Saturday morning, pulverizing the record of the Austrian ups and downs. Both in the Sprint and in the long race, however, in the very early stages he had to surrender to the explosiveness of Bagnaia, who immediately took the lead of the group and put himself in the ideal conditions to manage the pace. A nice change of perspective if you consider that the one known for his ability to be fast from the start was him. But the Madrid native had no problem admitting it.

“There are no excuses, we improved a little bit at the beginning, but I’m frustrated. I thought I could stay with Pecco until the end, but the temperature of the front tyre went up a lot. I got a second place which is not what I expected, but it’s a good result for the championship,” Martin said.

“I rode well, I had a great race, but after he passed me I chose to wait a bit, and that was clearly the wrong decision. I think if I had stayed in the lead it would have been a different race; we need to change our mentality a bit,” he added.

Then the Spaniard underlined once again how much being in front makes the difference when the values ​​are close as between him and Bagnaia at this moment: “At a certain point the front tyre said enough. Then when I was two seconds away, I started to feel a bit more at ease, because the front tyre was a bit better. The pace was very similar, but being behind is impossible to do anything: either I risked something more or the best I could do was second place. Whoever puts himself first at the beginning has a 90% chance of winning”.

Even though the gap is only 5 points after 11 races, Jorge did not hide that the Piedmontese probably has a little more at the moment. After all, in the last six weekends he has only taken home one Sprint in Germany, and to find his last Sunday success you have to go back to Le Mans.

“Pecco and I are one step ahead of the others. Maybe one time he is third, one time I am, but in the end we are always there. So you can recover 5 points one time, 3 another time. I hope to be able to fight until the end, because we are going very strong and we are pushing ourselves to raise the level. At the moment Pecco seems a little stronger, but I hope to get back in line again”.

Consistent with not looking for excuses, he finally explained that the stitches on his thumb were not a problem in today’s race: “I was 100%. There is a little blood, but I took some painkillers and today it was not a problem. I hope it does not get infected and to resolve it for Aragon”.