Natural-born risk-taker Marc Márquez made the difference at rainy Misano and put himself in the title fight, while Bagnaia played the percentages and Martin messed up big time
Grey clouds above, rain spots on his visor, knee on the ground – Marquez risks it all as he leaves Bagnaia behind
Sunday’s San Marino MotoGP round was one of those funny weekends when many thousands of man (and woman) hours of riding, engineering, spannering and data-logging are swept into the bin of irrelevance by a few drops of rain. Your occasional reminder that nature is still in charge.
The Misano weather turned the 2024 MotoGP title fight on its head: a disaster for championship leader Jorge Martin, a blessing for title outsider Marc Márquez and neither one nor the other for reigning champion Pecco Bagnaia.
Winner Márquez suggested that the Gresini team’s late team boss – twice 125cc world champ Fausto Gresini – was the heavenly force that had sprinkled the track with rain, gifting him a victory chance that seemed gone when he crashed in qualifying, putting himself on the third row.
All teams use hi-tech weather radar systems that provide very detailed forecasts. However, these gizmos were for nothing on Sunday, because the locals – Bagnaia (who lives a few miles south of Misano) and Bastianini (born and bred in the area) – used their senses to decide their fate.
Racers talk a lot about the vital senses of feel, sight and hearing, but this time it was their sense of smell that saved the day, or otherwise.
“On Thursday here I smelt the smell of rain and it rained a lot,” said champ Bagnaia after the GP. “Today the smell was not the smell of rain.”
Bastianini said the same.
The early, dry laps – Bagnaia leads Martin, Morbidelli and Acosta – Márquez very much out of the picture
Dorna
The rain started at one-quarter distance, following some light drizzle on the grid, which receded, then returned. Front-row starter Franky Morbidelli was its first victim, crashing out third place at one-quarter distance, while chasing Bagnaia and Martin. A few corners later Martin got sideways, then ran off the track a few corners after that.
At the end of that lap, while still right behind Bagnaia, the Spaniard peeled into pit lane to swap to his rain-tyre equipped spare Ducati. None of the other front-runners did the same.
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Márquez was clever enough to do whatever the locals did. “I decided to follow the local guys – and all the Italian guys stayed out,” he said.
Everyone knows Márquez is the king of iffy conditions, when grip levels are so difficult to judge, and also a natural-born risk-taker. Both talents have played significant roles in his six MotoGP crowns, so when Misano became an ice rink, slowing lap times by around seven seconds, it was Márquez time.
“It was time to take a risk – I had nothing to lose,” added Márquez. “The next lap I attacked.”
In two laps Márquez went from sixth to first, Bagnaia offering no resistance as he relinquished the lead. After all, the most dangerous place to be when there’s rain coming and going is at the front, because you’ll be the first to hit any wet patches.
“When I saw Morbidelli had crashed I slowed down more – I didn’t want to take any risks,” added Bagnaia who then followed Márquez, using the new race leader both as his personal rain gauge and as a tow to help him escape from the pursuing pack.
Within a few laps Márquez was back up to full speed: head down, hammering out the laps, even breaking the lap record, never mind the ominous clouds that still hung over the track. Of course, there was no guarantee that the rain wouldn’t return – and can you imagine what it feels like heading into the 150mph Curvone right-hander with a few rain spots on your visor?
It was a dark day for Martin’s championship hopes
Bagnaia, hurting badly from his Aragon injuries, waved the white flag in the closing stages, taking the chequered flag well in front of team-mate Enea Bastianini, who ran out of rear tyre during the final laps.
What about Martin? He knew as soon as he rolled out of pit lane with rain tyres that he had screwed up. A few laps later he dejectedly returned to the pits to switch back to his slick-equipped bike.
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“It was raining, what else do you want me to say?” he shrugged. “I didn’t do the right strategy, that’s for sure. I thought to win it was better to stop. Next time I will just wait behind Pecco and do the same as him. It was wet. Morbidelli crashed, so for sure it was wet.”
Martin’s Pramac crew told him rain was coming, but they expected no more than a few drops.
Like many people in pit lane, Bagnaia’s team-manager Davide Tardozzi was incredulous at Martin’s decision.
“If you are fighting for a championship with someone and this guy comes into the pits to change bikes, you come in, if he doesn’t, you don’t,” he said.
So, Martin messed up big time, right? His mistake lost him maybe more than twenty points, which could cost him the championship
Yes, he had blundered, because hindsight is always 20/20, but it could so easily have been different.
What would’ve happened if the rain had fallen a wee bit harder for another lap or two – the leaders might’ve gone down in a heap and Martin might have been the hero of the day, instead of the fool.
MotoGP has been here before, of course. Many, many times.
Ten years ago at Aragon, the rain fell during the MotoGP race and while many riders rode into pit lane to change to their wet bikes, Márquez decided to stay out on slicks.
Márquez was joined on the podium by Luca Gresini, Fausto’s son
Dorna
This time the gamble didn’t work – a few laps later he was skating down the track on his backside and out of the race.
“I bet everything on red but black came up,” he said afterwards.
This time he bet everything on red and red came up.
A few years earlier the same happened to the late, great Ralf Waldmann.
Before the start of the 2000 British 250cc GP at Donington Park the clouds were gathering. Would rain come? Or not?
No one knew then, just like no one knew for sure at Misano on Sunday, weather radars or not.
At Donington the entire grid decided the rain would stay away, so they all chose slicks. Everyone, that is, apart from Waldmann.
The German started from the second row of the grid and from there went backwards, slithering around the bone-dry track on rain tyres: 11th on lap one, 16th on lap six, 21st at half-distance, one minute and 18 seconds behind leader Olivier Jacque!
And then it happened. Rain started falling. You can imagine the size of the grin behind Waldmann’s visor!
Now it was everyone else’s turn to slither around on the soaking track. Waldmann started passing rivals – one, two, three each lap, until he started the final lap in third place, still eleven seconds behind leader Jacque.
Jacque was still leading as he teetered through the final corner, trying not to crash, but Waldmann was charging hard and had so much extra grip he rocketed past the Frenchman on the way to the finish line to win by three tenths of a second.
Waldmann, always a bit of a philosopher, summed up the reality perfectly.
“When the race started on wet tyres, I was an idiot,” he said. “Then when it started raining and I could win, I was a hero. The difference between idiot and hero is very small.”
The same could’ve happened at Misano, so those calling Martin an idiot should remember Waldmann’s words.
Like Márquez, Brand Binder isn’t afraid to let it hang out when conditions are sketchy, scoring his second consecutive four place
KTM
What of the championship? Márquez rolled the dice and closed his championship disadvantage from 70 points behind Martin before Misano to 53 points, with 259 points still up for grabs. Those few laps of ultimate risk have put him firmly in the title fight.
“This victory was totally unexpected, because I was starting from ninth,” said Márquez. “Without the drops of rain it would’ve been impossible to fight with the top guys. One point is to lead the race, another is to open a gap on the world champion, who is super-fast here. I was able to ride in a very good way – I’m super-happy. And I want to say thanks to Fausto, because I think he dropped some water from the sky! This victory is for all the Gresini family.”
Márquez finally got himself and his GP23 back to full competitiveness – after a lull in results following a strong start to the season – during last month’s Austrian GP, so whereas his focus was on the 2025 title, his willingness to let it all hang out at Misano has brought the 2024 MotoGP crown into his sights.
“You never know,” he grinned. “Especially when we leave Europe and go to Asia, you know how the weather can be at times. I will continue with my mentality, but if we want to fight for championship we cannot make mistakes like I did in qualifying and start from ninth on the grid. We need to keep going and keep improving.”
Bagnaia, who won his first MotoGP crown in 2022 after coming from 91 points down on Fabio Quartararo, knows how things work.
“Marc was the bravest today,” he said. “But everything can change very quickly, same for Marc, same for me. We know Marc’s potential and it looks like he has again found what he had in the first part of the championship. Never put Marc out of the title contenders!”
