MotoGP 2015

[Edax]

I think I can agree with noname. Rosso ruined an otherwise fantastic finale. Without that action on Marquez he wouldn't have incured a penalty and we'd had our race down to the wire. I really feel robbed ever since Sepang. The 2015 season will always be stained for me because of this.

I think that what happened is a shame especially for Lorenzo. The guy is a good driver and this has put a dark lining on his championship despite the fact that there is nothing he could have done differently.

What Rossi and Marques is concerned. Marquez IMO broke one of the unwritten rules of motorracing. Every man or woman has the right to go for a race win in every race (otherwise it is called a parade). But when there is a tense fight for the championship you don't interfere. You may pass if you're faster but you don't take risks.

Its the similar to when you are a lap down. There is no rule that forbids you to unlap yourself, but that does not mean that you can hurl your bike in the first available opening and push the other out.

Maybe that's a bit more extreme as an example. But I do think that Marquez was far too aggressive in Sepang, he was not really faster so he should have dropped out of the fight long before Rossi made him drop out. Instead he kept trying with moves that were on or over the limit.

Does that excuse the move by Rossi? Assuming that it was intentional, no, and the punishment was correct.

Did Rossi have the right to be angry at Marquez behavior. Absolutely. Looking at it, it is a miracle that they both stayed upright up to that point. And the chance seems big that they would have crashed a few miles down the road and then we would have a similar result, Lorenzo being champion being denied a proper fight with Rossi.

A racer has also remember that he is part of an entertainment industry. In the end his salary is payed by the viewers, most of them who just want to see Rossi and Lorenzo going against each other. If Marquez wanted to be part of that spectacle he should have stayed more on his bike at the beginning of the season, so he could properly fight with the championship contenders at the end.

[Gatecrasher]

JL agrees as well...


In a bizarre twist, Lorenzo appeared to support Rossi’s claim in an interview with Movistar MotoGP channel Whilst denying that “any pact” existed between him and Marquez he intimated that his compatriots had helped him win the title by not passing him.

“They knew what I had in play,” Lorenzo said.

“The fact they are Spaniards like me helped me.

“That helped me because for sure in another kind of race they would have tried to overtake which they didn’t this time.” He added: “If Valentino had been in my position and with Italians behind they would have done exactly the same.

“The title had to be for Spain.”


http://m.foxsports.com.au/motor-sport/m ... 7600925296

I was always a Rossi fan, this year has been great to watch, just did not expect the vocal outbursts in public from him.

Looks like I am now a Dani + a Duc supporter, we need one more manufacturer consistently at the front. Next year if it is only these three up front it will be worse, instead of three races that look dodgy the full year will have armchair pundits calling foul for every move.

[J.A.W.]

For the record, I am leaving the picture of george-jung here. It is nothing more then a humoristic play with the situation. Perhaps the picture could have been a bit more cropped to remove the distasteful pukes, but whatever.

"...Distasteful pukes.."

Huh ? A wierd bit of contrived gay-porn fantasy that hardly belongs in a 'technical' forum IMO..

As for the only too-real spectacle of Rossi receiving an A-Style consolation pash from his longterm squeeze Uccio, post-race..Now that's a tad queasy-churning, for sure..

[oT v1]

Looks like I am now a Dani + a Duc supporter, we need one more manufacturer consistently at the front. Next year if it is only these three up front it will be worse, instead of three races that look dodgy the full year will have armchair pundits calling foul for every move.

Or at least from another Honda/Yamaha team? MotoGP has missed a strong Gresini/Poncheral team for years(even a Tamada-Camel honda would be nice to spice things up). We had Marco Sic in 2011 but they didnt seem to like that 'boat rocking', Stoner/Jorge/Dani bullying and undermining him all the way to his death, part 1 of this, now evident, Spain vs everyone else rift. If it was anyone else than Rossi that had done that in Malaysia Dorna would have buried them!

I like Dani also but he needs to step up finally, if the 4 of them can fight in 2016 it would be amazing and people probably wont miss that 3rd manufacturer! if not, we need Stoner on a 3rd Repsol (even though i hate him) for 2016.

[GPR-A duplicate2]

What Rossi and Marques is concerned. Marquez IMO broke one of the unwritten rules of motorracing.

If it is not written, then it is just a fantasy of viewers. There is no such thing called UNWRITTEN RULES.

But when there is a tense fight for the championship you don't interfere. You may pass if you're faster but you don't take risks.

That is exactly what MM did. Didn't interfered in the last race at all and because he wasn't fighting for championship, he didn't tried to take risk and pass Lorenzo. Ha...

Maybe that's a bit more extreme as an example. But I do think that Marquez was far too aggressive in Sepang, he was not really faster so he should have dropped out of the fight long before Rossi made him drop out. Instead he kept trying with moves that were on or over the limit.

So after first race whichever two riders lead the championship, rest everyone should move out of the way and simply allow those two riders to fight? This is racing. You win by beating everyone and every single time. It is stupidity to expect others to move out of way.

Does that excuse the move by Rossi? Assuming that it was intentional, no, and the punishment was correct.

Punishment? He should have been black flagged, but survived because he is Rossi. No other rider would have survived that.

Did Rossi have the right to be angry at Marquez behavior. Absolutely. Looking at it, it is a miracle that they both stayed upright up to that point. And the chance seems big that they would have crashed a few miles down the road and then we would have a similar result, Lorenzo being champion being denied a proper fight with Rossi.

Every rider should carry a gun along while racing. When the rider gets angry on another, take a gun and shoot? Yeah. It works. It was Rossi who didn't knew how to handle a charging rider. Old guy almost fell few corners before. Out of pure frustration of unable to handle, he then went to confront MM and did the unthinkable.

A racer has also remember that he is part of an entertainment industry. In the end his salary is payed by the viewers, most of them who just want to see Rossi and Lorenzo going against each other.

That is only your opinion and not a fact.

If Marquez wanted to be part of that spectacle he should have stayed more on his bike at the beginning of the season, so he could properly fight with the championship contenders at the end.

Similarly, If Rossi wanted to win the championship, he should have won more than 4 out of 18 available. Instead of putting all his prayers on Honda riders to overtake Lorenzo in the LAST RACE. MM has won more times than Rossi did this year, despite not staying on the bike so many times. Rossi was just pathetically slow and didn't deserve to win.

I have always liked Rossi and he is a phenomenon. "46" is legend. I can't remember another rider who has such a following across the globe. I was rooting for him until Assen. I was wishing that he ends the journey with one more title. But his behavior since Australia is simply not what he is liked for.

[Samraj_official]

2016 could be troublesome for Rossi much like his mediocre 2013 year in the wake of resurgent pedrosa and super fast marc and jorge and one more............MICHELIN TIRES... http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/121725

[CBeck113]

For the record, I am leaving the picture of george-jung here. It is nothing more then a humoristic play with the situation. Perhaps the picture could have been a bit more cropped to remove the distasteful pukes, but whatever.

"...Distasteful pukes.."

Huh ? A wierd bit of contrived gay-porn fantasy that hardly belongs in a 'technical' forum IMO..

As for the only too-real spectacle of Rossi receiving an A-Style consolation pash from his longterm squeeze Uccio, post-race..Now that's a tad queasy-churning, for sure..

Ii think he meant pubes, as in pubic hair...

[Andres125sx]

I have always liked Rossi and he is a phenomenon. "46" is legend. I can't remember another rider who has such a following across the globe. I was rooting for him until Assen. I was wishing that he ends the journey with one more title. But his behavior since Australia is simply not what he is liked for.

Same here, except I rooted him past Assen, until Philip Island. In Assen that was a clasic Rossi move, on the edge, but not enough to clearly say he did it on purpose. Same, for example, than in Jerez with Gibernau. He´s always been very good playing this games while staying within the limits.

But in Philip Island he did somethin new, something he had never done before, accusing a fellow rider about manipulating the championship on purpose to favour Lorenzo only because he´s spanish. And Rossi said that after Marc passed Jorge in last lap and won the race!!

That was a complete nosense, something I would have bet an arm I´d never hear from Rossi, but I´d have lost it


To me reality is crystal clear, Rossi knew he had no pace to fight for the title because Jorge, Marc and even Pedrosa from time to time were faster in last races, so he defamed Marc to see if that way he´s forced to beat Lorenzo and clean his name, so Marc does for him what he can´t do himself, take away some points from Lorenzo´s scoreboard

But Marc didn´t bite.


IMHO it was Rossi who tried to manipulate the championship with dirty mind games. Marc obviously got furious about this and in Sepang he replied on track. You think I´m disturbing you on purpose? No man, but I´ll show you how disturbing you on purpose looks like on this race so you learn the difference. Applause if you ask me, defaming someone should never be free, he deserved a tough reply. Rossi couldn´t cope with this as his strategy was exactly the opposite, he should be disturbing Jorge not him, and kicked him.

Then in Valencia it was all said, Rossi would have finished 4th independently of his grid position, and Marc passing Jorge would have changed nothing, with Jorge 2nd he´d be world champion too. Even if Marc didn´t pass him on purpose, to me it´d be ok. If someone try to manipulate me as Rossi did with Marc, I´d do what I can to prevent that person from getting any benefit from me

[Phil]

To me reality is crystal clear, Rossi knew he had no pace to fight for the title because Jorge, Marc and even Pedrosa from time to time were faster in last races...

I admittedly haven't been following the MotoGP series and only just watched the last race, but wasn't Rossi despite fewer wins actually leading the championship by 7 points into the last race? So even while he may not have been the best throughout the year (I didn't watch it), he did somehow end up with more points going into that last race...

Anyway, I thought it was quite anti climax. It was awesome seeing Rossi battle through the field and it was rather unfortunate to see what seemed like a prearranged farce between Marc and Jorge. Not the best ad for MotoGP or motorsports in general. Seeing how Rossi came through the field, one would have hoped to see Marc attempt something, anything while sitting so close to Jorge. As an entire outsider and not having watched a MotoGP for years, that certainly looked very "staged". It's a pitty Pedrosa came too late to the party - it certainly would have made things a lot more interesting.

[turbof1]

To me reality is crystal clear, Rossi knew he had no pace to fight for the title because Jorge, Marc and even Pedrosa from time to time were faster in last races...

I admittedly haven't been following the MotoGP series and only just watched the last race, but wasn't Rossi despite fewer wins actually leading the championship by 7 points into the last race? So even while he may not have been the best throughout the year (I didn't watch it), he did somehow end up with more points going into that last race...

Anyway, I thought it was quite anti climax. It was awesome seeing Rossi battle through the field and it was rather unfortunate to see what seemed like a prearranged farce between Marc and Jorge. Not the best ad for MotoGP or motorsports in general. Seeing how Rossi came through the field, one would have hoped to see Marc attempt something, anything while sitting so close to Jorge. As an entire outsider and not having watched a MotoGP for years, that certainly looked very "staged". It's a pitty Pedrosa came too late to the party - it certainly would have made things a lot more interesting.

In all honesty Rossi was better in the first races of the season, and in races with damp conditions. Whenever Lorenzo missed out on confidence, and there were quite a lot of those situations, Rossi was better.

Combined with Marquez having an overal horrid season, and Pedrosa outright missing the first races and taking a while to get back in the rithm.

[Andres125sx]

and it was rather unfortunate to see what seemed like a prearranged farce between Marc and Jorge.

Not as much as hearing how Rossi accused Marc after Philip Island about manipulating the championship despite he won the race passing Jorge in last lap. That really was unfortunate and the cause of all the later controversy

one would have hoped to see Marc attempt something

And that was his plan before Pedrosa passed him. After Rossi´s statement in Philip Island and his kick in Sepang I was rooting for Lorenzo despite he has never been one of my favourites, so in last part of the race, when Marc managed to catch up, I was afraid of him. It was obvious he was preparing for a pass in last laps. But then Pedrosa passed him, they both lost some tenths, and couldn´t try it.

But even if it was on purpose, to me it´s ok after Rossi behaviour in Philip Island and Sepang.

but wasn't Rossi despite fewer wins actually leading the championship by 7 points into the last race? So even while he may not have been the best throughout the year (I didn't watch it), he did somehow end up with more points going into that last race...

Of course, he did a very constant season while Lorenzo did some mistakes, but in last part of the championship he was not on same perfomance level than Jorge, so even when he was leading the championship he was not the favourite. At least IMO. I said several GPs back IMO Jorge would win the title easy because of this. It was not that easy, but Rossi was too far from the perfomance you´d expect from a World Champion, so even if you ignore all what happened in last races, to me Lorenzo deserved the title more than Rossi, only considering perfomance on track.

[Edax]

There is no such thing called UNWRITTEN RULES.

I guess you are:
a) not married
b) still honeymooning and oblivious of what's next.
c) the luckiest hustband and the envy of us all

Does that excuse the move by Rossi? Assuming that it was intentional, no, and the punishment was correct.

Punishment? He should have been black flagged, but survived because he is Rossi. No other rider would have survived that.

Below I quoted some snippets from the interview with Webb. I think it is pretty well argumented and balanced. For me it explains why the punishment was given after the race and why it was what it was. I can live with it.

“I'm not going to quote what the riders said in the hearing but I can give you a general idea,” Webb began. “So from what we saw it would appear to be a deliberate move on Rossi's part to push Marquez off the track, or push him wide.

“Despite what Marquez said we think he was deliberately trying to affect the pace of Valentino. However he didn't actually break any rules. Whatever we think about the spirit of the championship, according to the rule book he didn't make contact. His passes were clean. He rode within the rules

No decision was taken during the actual race as Webb said he wanted to speak to both riders and watch the video replays at length.

“Rossi's evidence is that his foot came off the foot-peg as a result of the contact. From all the video evidence there is no clear shot that definitely shows that his foot slipped off the foot-peg because of contact or that he deliberately kicked. I don't have that as a 'smoking gun' if you like.

Read more at http://www.crash.net/motogp/news/224594 ... 0HkyEYZ.99

A racer has also remember that he is part of an entertainment industry. In the end his salary is payed by the viewers, most of them who just want to see Rossi and Lorenzo going against each other.

That is only your opinion and not a fact.

With roughly a quarter of a billion changing hands annually it is naive to think that it is more than an entertainment industry. Its a circus made to enjoy people. Its our problem that we take it seriously (somewhat). If the public would have preferred drivers to drive around on mopeds with clownssuits, hitting each other with inflatable bats, Lorenzo, Rossi and Marquez would be wearing big red noses.

As for Rossi vs Lorenzo. My guess is that if that statement wasn't true then we would not be having this conversation. The sheer amount of articles, internet discussions and polls do reflect that people do care. That's not a hard fact as it is difficult to quantify but I would rate it stronger than an opinion.
https://www.change.org/p/motogp-dorna-a ... ampionship
http://www.speedcafe.com/2015/10/27/pol ... alty-fair/
http://totalbikers.com/t/poll-malaysian ... -blame/321

[Phil]

And that was his plan before Pedrosa passed him.

I know that's what he said to his defense post race, but watching the race, neither me, nor the commentators (Eurosport) really believed that. It was like when Pedrosa came close, Marc suddenly found another gear which was entirely missing from the earlier few laps. I just don't think it's likely. He didn't attempt a single thing, nor did she show any signs that he was about to contest for that position. It was a very different kind of driving compared to Rossi who earlier in the race was setting himself and trying things to get past, or even Perdrosa when he was catching up the two front runners.

At various points before Pedrosa caught up did the commentators question what Marc was doing and surely he had the pace to drive quicker. That's exactly what it felt like for me too as an entire outsider and non-Rossi fan. I could care less either way who won the title, as, as I said, I haven't been following the MotoGP season so couldn't judge either way, but this battle at the front felt so staged. I would have been nicer if they had battled and whoever who was quicker came out in front. Odds are, Lorenzo would have won the championship either way, so no issue with that.

Anyway, it's nice to see (for a change) that other forms of motorsports are inflicted with issues like these, not just F1...

[Andres125sx]

And that was his plan before Pedrosa passed him.

I know that's what he said to his defense post race, but watching the race, neither me, nor the commentators (Eurosport) really believed that.

Not the case here, Angel Nieto said the contrary, and I also was conviced about it. He was some tenths far for most of the race, and managed to catch up in final part of the race. This is exactly what have happened in some other races, the Hondas catching up when tanks are light, not new but more of a pattern or trend.

And seriously, you only need to look at Marc when he was really close to Jorge, to realize how close to the limit he was riding. He was far from a comfortable pace, he was, as always, on the limit.

It was a very different kind of driving compared to Rossi who earlier in the race was setting himself and trying things to get past, or even Perdrosa when he was catching up the two front runners.

Obviously, because neither of them were chasing the fasters rider on the track, who was Lorenzo

At various points before Pedrosa caught up did the commentators question what Marc was doing and surely he had the pace to drive quicker.

Surely? That´s something wich never came to my mind for a single instant, IMHO Jorge was the fastest rider on the track, and he also was the one riding with some margin. He was smooth, mistakes free, his bike was on rails.... while Marc bike was very unstable specially compared with the Yamaha.

I seriously can´t understand where did you (and the comentators) got he surely had more pace

[Phil]

Just for the fun of it, since I have the race saved, I watched it again:

I seriously can´t understand where did you (and the commentators) got he surely had more pace

For instance because this is how close the gap was with 8 laps to go:



If you are that close, you are benefiting of slip streaming. Pedrosa who was at that point gaining, also showed what pace that Honda had even before he caught up those two and got into both their slip streams. Anyway, from what I read Marquez is an extremely talented but also known for his aggressive driving. That aggressive driving was suddenly visible when Pedrosa made his move, but was lacking the entirety of 8 laps before when he was right in Lorenzos slip stream. It was so weird, that the commentators on Eurosport were in constant talk about it until they put it down to him not wanting to fight for that win. It certainly didn't look that way.

Even if we put some weight behind the logic that he was waiting for the last possible moment (despite being on Lorenzos tail for god knows how many laps before already), why would he wait if can see in his rear mirrors that the gap to his fellow rider Pedrosa constantly closing?! Logic would dictate that once he himself is under attack, that he will lose time. I'm sure a rider of the caliber of Marquez was fully aware of that too and yet that didn't lead him to even attempt a single move for the lead. He not once showed even the slightest intention of trying to force Lorenzo into a mistake or amounting more pressure by driving more aggressively.

Just for the fun of it; Here's a grab with 5 laps to go;



Note the gap at this point to Pedrosa. Note how extremely close Marquez is to Lorenzo. And yet, despite this gap, he never even once attempted to make a move, despite Perdrosa itching closer and closer in his rear-mirrors. This doesn't look to me here that Marquez did the best he could, not after following him closely for over 8 laps to the line.