Last weekend Mugello, and this weekend Barcelona. The first back-to-back race in the 2021 MotoGP season. MotoGP has moved on. It’s moving on. Everyone is working. And yet, there are memories. Memories of what happened last Saturday at Mugello. Memories of what happened in Barcelona five years ago. The drivers have to live with all that. They have to learn to deal with it and process it. Process it so that they can move on, so that fear doesn’t win. Jason and also Luis were omnipresent, whether in the posts on social media, in the reporting, on the bikes or on the podium. The memories live on. It’s the only way to keep going.
This season continues to be unpredictable. If you think you have identified a favorite, a favorite manufacturer, everything shifts again at the next race. First Ducati, then Yamaha. Now KTM? The Reds seemed to dominate the season from the start. Then at Mugello they failed to score a podium finish. Fabio Quartararo is flying the flag for Yamaha. The young Frenchman took his fifth pole in a row in Barcelona. In the race itself, the Yamaha rider was able to keep up for a long time, until his material broke down shortly before the end. In the TV picture you could only see how Quartararo rode with open leather suit and threw away his chest protector. Shortly afterwards, a braking error happened to him directly behind Zarco in third position. The Yamaha rider left the track and regrouped too early. In the end, he received a 3-sec penalty and thus fell behind Jack Miller to fourth place. About this penalty transfer, you can perhaps argue. What is undisputed for me is that Quartararo should have been taken out of the race. The regulations clearly stipulate that the equipment must be in perfect working order. In Quartararo’s case, it wasn’t. A crash would not have ended well for him. A black flag would have been appropriate.
But who won? The victory went to Miguel Oliveira. He came to Barcelona with a podium finish. This time he was able to sit at the top of the podium. The knot seems to have burst at KTM. Now a third manufacturer is in the mix at the top. The 2021 season is a close season, with exciting races and always new developments. What was assumed yesterday is no longer true today. We can all look forward to the Sachsenring, when the cards will be reshuffled again.
Your Miss MotoGP