MotoGP: Catalunya Grand Prix – Marquez Wins as Lorenzo Causes Chaos

The sun was shining over the Catalunya Circuit for the . The fans turned out in their thousands to watch the MotoGP gladiators do battle on the 10 years anniversary of that incredible last lap battle of Valentino Rossi and Jorge Lorenzo.

The heat for the race was the hottest it had been all weekend at 46°C, the track proving to be very difficult for all riders throughout the weekend with many complaining that the circuit felt like riding on “ice”.

Fabio Quartararo found himself on pole position for the second time in 2019, ahead of Marc Marquez and Quartararo’s team-mate Franco Morbidelli. The stage was set for a race that would have thrills and spills in front of the adoring Spanish fans on the 70th anniversary of the championships inception.

Andrea Dovizioso put the Ducati’s holeshot device to good use and launched himself into the lead into turn 1 ahead of Marc Marquez and the fast starting Maverick Vinales. The Spaniard on the Yamaha made his way past Marquez into 2nd at turn 4.

It was the fast starting Jorge Lorenzo that was the one to watch, starting from 10th on the grid. By the start of lap 2, he was on the back of his team-mate and very nearly rammed Marquez on the exit of turn 4.

Disaster would strike at the horrendous tight turn 10 when Marquez would make his way underneath Dovizioso but Jorge Lorenzo making a pass on Vinales saw a gap closing as Dovizioso was making his way back onto the racing line. Lorenzo locked the front and in doing so crashed, taking out Dovizioso, Vinales and the unfortunate Rossi who had just made a move on his fellow countryman Danillo Petrucci but ran wide to avoid the crash and got tangled up with Jorge Lorenzo’s Repsol Honda. The Doctor remounted his bike but his day was over as he rode back to the pits.

That incident left Marquez with a sizeable lead over Petrucci, the Ducati rider not being able to hold the pace of Marquez but he was embroiled in an epic scrap for 2nd place with Alex Rins. Over the next 5 laps Alex Rins would look up the inside of Petrucci into turn 1 – the Suzuki rider being able to keep in the slipstream of Petrucci down the straight – but Petrucci was very tough on the brakes and held position.

The heat of the battle came to ahead with eleven laps remaining and Rins saw a gap on the exit of turn 4 and barged Petrucci out of the way and pulled ahead. The Suzuki rider tried to pull a gap but Petrucci didn’t let Rins get away too far and with 8 laps to go got ahead once again. Alex Rins tried to get ahead of the Ducati rider into turn 1 with 6 laps remaining but had to sit the bike up so not to hit Petrucci and he dropped back into 7th spot.

It would be the 20 year old French rider – Fabio Quartararo – making his way up to 2nd with 5 laps remaining and started closing the gap to Marquez but with a gap of 5.3 seconds, the ask would be too much.

Marc Marquez took his 4th win of the season and increased his lead in the championship over Andrea Dovizioso to 37 points. Fabio Quartararo held on to take what must be his first of many podiums over his career, as his star shines ever brighter. He becomes the youngest ever rider to stand on the podium in the MotoGP class – at 20 years and 57 days and took the podium only 10 days after an operation to sort out issues he has had with arm pump, saying after the race that he “could feel the scar stretching” during the race. Danillo Petrucci picked up his 3rd podium on the bounce and salvaged what had become a difficult day for Ducati.

Alex Rins recovered to finish in 4th spot after passing Jack Miller on the inside through turn 4, the Australian picking up 5th place ahead of Joan Mir, the rookie scoring his best result in MotoGP.

Moto2

Agusto Fernandez would start from his first career pole position in the Moto2 class, alongside him would be Swiss rider Tom Luthi and Brit rider, Sam Lowes. Luthi got the jump at the start and took the lead ahead of Fernandez and Sam Lowes, Alex Marquez – from 5th on the grid – got ahead of the SpeedUp of Fabio Di Giannantonio but Marquez got ran wide by Di Giannantonio and pushed back to 6th.

Luthi was hunted down by Fernandez in the early stages of the race, the young Spaniard showing great form in the previous races after he came back from injury after a nasty crash in Argentina. Marquez had moved himself up into 3rd spot by lap 3 setting a new lap record – 1:43.871 and began chasing down the top 2.

Fernandez made a late move on Luthi in turn 10 and sat the Swiss rider up and pushing him wide on lap 4. Tom Luthi retook the lead on lap 6 into turn 1. This back and forth between the top two, allowed Marquez to catch the back of the pair.

It was a disaster for championship leader Lorenzo Baldassarri, crashing out of 9th position on lap 6 of the race at the tough turn 10, the corner capturing another victim. The corner would later claim another victim in the hands of Di Giannantonio, losing the front as he was in 3rd spot.

Marquez made his way past Fernandez down the home straight at the start of lap 8 – as he began to see Luthi pull a gap at the front. Both riders were setting identical lap times – 1:44.4. Lap 13 saw Marquez make his way to the front and quickly opening a small gap on Luthi, the Swiss rider would hand onto the back of the Spaniard over the following 5 laps but Marquez would increase his lead to over 2 seconds at the start of the final lap.

The Marc VDS rider would hold the lead until the flag, taking his 3rd win of the season, his 3rd in as many races, it would be his 6th Moto2 career win and his 10th career win, after his 4 wins in Moto3. His win makes him the first rider in Moto2 to win at the Catalunya circuit on multiple occasions, winning back in 2017. He also becomes the first rider since Miguel Oliviera to win 3 races on the bounce since the Portuguese rider won the final 3 races of 2017.

Marquez takes over the lead of the championship on 111 points, 7 ahead of Luthi, with early championship leader Baldassari dropping to 4th, 23 points behind Marquez and 1 point behind Jorge Navarro, the Spaniard showing great form in 2019, scoring his 4th podium of the season.

Moto3

The first race of the day was not short of action and attrition. The Moto3 riders were let loose out of their cage to start the race day proceedings.

Tatsuki Suzuki was the first rider to crash out of the race at the tight turn 10 hairpin, after he was hit by Albert Arenas. That corner would be costly for a lot of riders and see a number of incidents before the chequered flag.

Can Oncu, the youngest race winner in Grand Prix, would cause chaos with 17 laps remaining as he went lat on the brakes in to turn 4 and and clipped Arenas and then took down Raul Fernandez and Sergio Garcia, seconds later at the same corner Vicente Perez and Filip Salac crashed out.

Turn 1 saw Jaime Masia and Darryn Binder come together with the Spaniard – Masia crashing out after clipping binder on the inside of the corner.

With 6 laps remaining, there was eighteen riders dicing with each other in the leading group with Tom Booth- Amos on the back, those eighteen riders were the only riders not to crash. With a few laps remaining, the pole sitter Gabriel Rodrigo went deep on the brakes into turn 10 and crashed into Binder taking both down, Binder would remount to finish 15th.

British hopes were pinned on the Scotman – John McPhee, he was in the leading group from start to finish and was leading the race on many occasions. McPhee found himself in 5th spot on the final lap but couldn’t find himself a way past Marcos Ramirez in 4th. Kaito Toba lead the final lap but trail braked into turn 10 and crashed out from the lead. Leaving Ramirez to take the lead ahead of Aron Canet and Vietti. McPhee, launched himself over the top of the handlebars after he asked too much from the throttle but managed to hold on to the bike to finish 13th.

Ramirez held off Canet to take his first career race win and in doing so, making it the 12th different race winner in as many races in the Moto3 class. Canet increased his lead in the championship after Dalla Porta ran into bike troubles in the early stages of the race. Celestino Vietti took his 3rd career podium in his 11th Moto3 race.

Turn 10 – Change Is Needed?

Once again turn 10 at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya caused chaos for all 3 classes. It has been a catalyst for a number of huge crashes over the years, most notably Andrea Iannone taking out Jorge Lorenzo in 2016. The corner had been changed from the popular long left hand corner in 2016 following the fatal crash for Luis Salom during practice.

The circuit, along with the organisers and riders decided to use the much tighter turn 10 hairpin which had been used for Formula 1 since 2008. After safety changes were made to the circuit ahead of 2018 pushing the barrier further back at turn 13, meaning after two years of using the Formula 1 chicane at the end of the lap the riders could use the fast penultimate right hand corner once again. Although the new tighter turn 10 right hand corner would remain as the barrier on the outside meaning there was little run off.

The issue with the turn is that the corner comes back on itself and coming from a fast straight, the rider has to brake very deep and very hard. The corner interrupts the flow of the rest of the circuit and riders struggle to get stopped at the corner especially in large groups when one rider out-brakes themselves, runs deep into the corner and finds another rider in front of them crossing the line and taking the turn normally.

With Formula 1 potentially not making a return to the Catalan circuit for 2020, surely their should be a call for the barrier on the outside of turn 10 to be pushed back (take a look at the above picture) and the removal of the chicane before the final turn. This would allow for further run off at turn 10 and reduce the number of incidents at the turn. Even if Formula 1 returns, the safety in the sport and the added run off at the penultimate corner means that even with the speed of the cars, they would be able to skip the chicane meaning the turn 10 barrier could be pushed back.

Turn 10 has caused many collisions over the years and many in all three classes over the weekend, including a coming together on the opening lap between Bradley Smith and his team-mate Aleix Espargaro. The safety if the turn has to be called into question and a change has to be seriously considered.