Winners
Pecco Bananas
Pecco started this season as every journalist’s red-hot favourite to take the title – and they of course knew best. Ducati bought the hype in a flash and re-signed him for the next million years knowing he would be the new world champion.
But after the first race it was universally decided that Bagnaia probably wasn’t quite as red-hot as we were told he was. Two races in and the beard-shod Italian had scored just one point and was looking worse than Mick Doohan’s knee cartilage. Ducati would have been ready to hang themselves with spaghetti if they’d not signed the new, new world championship hotshot Jorge Martin…and of course that couldn’t go wrong…
Slowly though Pecco started to find his pace…then he found it very, very quickly at Jerez.
For reasons unknown the Ducati rider was considerably faster than all his rivals. And in the race, where everyone thought Fabio would win, Bagnaia was again in a different league.
MotoGP makes no sense.
Fabio Quartarararararo
To win a world championship you need to know when you’re beaten and take the best points available. That’s exactly what Fabio did in Jerez.
And it was so boring.
See Alain Prost’s career for further details.
Marc Marquez’s left elbow
In the good old days when MotoGP was ruined by Marc Marquez the gifted Spaniard would sensationally save a lowside spill with the power of his elbow. We all marvelled open-mouthed at his skill and strength…or yelled ‘cheater’ at the screen if dressed in yellow. We thought we’d never get bored of seeing him do it…but then we did.
Marquez would pull off this physics defying move so often that it became the norm. Like a boring Space Shuttle launch ten years after it was exciting.
But, like the Space Shuttle, one crash too many caused it all to end. In the Spaniard’s case it was his infamous Jerez crash in 2020 that ruined his shoulder whilst creating desktop background images for many Italians. After that crash Marc simply didn’t have the strength in his left shoulder to perform his once normal lowside save. Instead he’d fall off and injure his arm more whilst his eye fell out.
But all that changed in Jerez 2022. Whilst fighting hard (or dirty depending on your hatred views) for third position with Jack Miller and Aleix Espargaro the antichrist Repsol Honda lost the front of his bike into the final corner. The Spanish crowd gasped…the Italians at home got ready to cheer… And Marquez…well he did the now forgotten save once again. Horrah!
Now we’re left wondering…did he somehow damage his shoulder doing the save and will he be off sick again?
Jorge Martin
Ducati know a thing or two about signing riders at the wrong time. The Italian firm famously kicked Jorge Lorenzo out of their squad just as the personality-free Spaniard started winning for them.
Last week It was public knowledge that the private news was that Jorge Martin had already signed to replace Jack Miller. The move was supposedly done after Martin, who for some inexplicable reason thinks it’s cool to call himself ‘the Martinator’, finished second in the third race at Argentina.
So, given their terrible, knee-jerk choices of old, should Ducati have waited? 6 races in and Jorge Martin is way down the championship order in 13th with almost half the points of his teammate. Worse still he’s fallen off unaided in four of the six races – a stat that would send Marc Marquez even dizzier.
But despite this Martin can sit back smiling knowing that he can continue to be rubbish and still ride for the factory team next season.
Marco Bezzecchi
Bezzecchi’s 9th place finish was the end to an overall impressive weekend for the infant Italian. Despite being a MotoGP rookie he looks set to continue to be yet another teammate that Luca Marini can’t beat…but who doesn’t have a famous brother to ensure that doesn’t matter.
Not a winner. Not a loser. Not anything
Miguel Oliveira
“Spin the wheel of chance and see where Miguel lands”
No idea where MRNG finished this week…and I can’t be bothered Googling it either
Losers
Aprilia
It’s official. Alex Espargaro’s heroic third place finish means that Aprilia have lost their concessions and can no longer legally be classed as rubbish.
This means next season they’ll not have the extra test sessions for Maverick Vinales to impress everyone at and claim he has racing winning pace…only to then not have race winning pace in the race.
Raul Fernandez
It seems that Raul’s hating MotoGP. He wanted to stay in Moto2 for an extra year but KTM are now contractually his legal parents so forced him screaming into MotoGP. He also wanted to ride anything but a second-string KTM…again though he was forced to join Tech 3.
To get back he’s claiming he’s injured. At Jerez he was asked my the medical clinic to do a push-up to prove he was fit enough to ride…but said he couldn’t so didn’t bother trying. Tech 3 manager Herve Poncharal was said to be less than impressed with his rider’s attitude.
The Suzuki staff
Alas we finish on the sad news that the powers that be at Suzuki are pulling the plug on their MotoGP team who’ll all be left unemployed at the end of the season. Rubbish news.
It appears that none of the team members at Suzuki knew anything about the move until Monday after the race.
Finger’s crossed that whichever team fills the spot of Suzuki will rehire the staff.