In the past few years the MotoGP championship celebrations have hit a new level of stupidity – what used to be about spraying champagne and waving flags has turned into a full-on cringe-worthy circus act.
The issue is that each champion wants to outdo the last one…but is constrained by the fact they can’t ever be sure of a title victory. So as the ambition goes up, the logistics and costs remain the same leaving us with a primary school nativity play level production.
Step forward Jorge Martin – also known, sadly, as “The Martinator”.
We, like everyone outside Jorge’s ‘yes men’ circle, think ‘Martinator’ is a god awful nickname. Almost as bad as Bradley Smith’s ill fated “Ginger Ninja” nickname that lasted about 30 minutes before his hair completely fell out.
Apparently Martin’s terrible nickname was given to him by his father. However just because your father gave you a nickname doesn’t mean you should stick with it through your adult life. “You ugly, useless twat” was a nickname often aimed at Max Verstappen from his loving and lovable father Jos – but Max didn’t feel the need to have that sewn on his arse.
But for his part Jorge still went with the “Martinator” theme and gave us a £1.50 Terminator tribute that would have had John Conner turning in his haircut.
So what were the reasons it was so bad? Let’s find out together…
The waiting
For his celebration Jorge first stepped into a cardboard box leaving us waiting to see what was about to happen. Frustratingly the answer was ‘nothing for ages’.
So we were forced to look at nothing happening – which given the race and season we’d just had to endure was an ironic final boot in the teeth. After a few minutes of nothing the TV producers clearly became bored and gave us some shots of crew members not celebrating or the crowd checking their watches to see if they’d missed the last paella home.
But, after a few months, the Spaniard pealed off the gaffer tape holding the flap of the cardboard door open and stepped out…
The new leathers
To maximise the Terminator effect Jorge swapped into some one-off leathers. This is what undoubtedly took so long. Sadly the leathers probably had to be ‘okayed’ by the team and their sponsors meaning the new apparel was almost identical to his normal leathers. In fact it was almost impossible to see the difference without use of an electron microscope.
In short Martin took and age to change into what he was already wearing.
The mask
Jorge appeared from the smoking carboard box wearing a ‘half man, half machine’ paper mask that had been hastily purchased from Poundland. It was even less convincing than Luca Marini’s “Make Honda great again” speech.
After wearing the mask for two entire seconds the Spaniard threw it off – maybe because the elastic band holding it on was hurting his ear. And that was that.
The littering
As well as throwing his £1 paper mask on the floor Martin also threw a half consumed can of Redbull into the gravel too. We’re not really sure what this signified but we are sure that Joan Mir will hit it next year unless it’s moved.
The ice box exploding
Okay this bit was quite good. At least the explosion…the part where Jorge pretended to shoot it was a tad cringe.
The overall sense of disappointment
Just like the 2024 MotoGP season we were left wondering if it was worth the watch.
Better option
We at MotoGPNews have loads of great ideas. Like the time we stole Gary McCoy’s banana stained tyre swing and had him chase us down the path with his lip curling up in a furious manner. So we, using what we’ve learnt over the many years of irritating people on the internet, have come up with a far better way that The Martinator could have celebrated:
- Park up the Ducati and douse it in petrol and set fire to it along with his helmet, gloves and leathers.
- Enter a big, cheap looking cardboard box filled with smoke.
- After an annoying amount of time burst out of the box riding an Aprilia with a big gold number one on it.
- Jump off the bike and wrestle a mannequin of Luigi Dall’Igna with a poorly fitted grey wig and a monobrow drawn on with a permanent marker. Win the fight and kick the defeated mannequin in the face numerous times before throwing it onto the fire.
- Punch a cardboard cutout of Carl Fogarty to generate a ‘fun aspect’ to proceedings.
- Ride back to the Aprilia garage and celebrate the win with them exclusively.