MotoMatters.com | Kropotkin Thinks

Five weeks off is quite the gap for MotoGP. The memories of the first half of the season have faded, so before I start to look ahead to Silverstone, here's a quick refresher on how we got here.

Previously, on MotoGP 2023...

MotoGP's season opener at Portimão turned into carnage. The cause? Added to the hypercharged levels of adrenaline present at the first race of the season each year – some riders seem to believe they can win the championship in the first corner of the first race, judging by the kamikaze energy with which they throw themselves into it – was the fact that Portimão is no Losail. A tight and difficult circuit, which had the added benefit of a couple of days of testing, with the concomitant rubber laid down, added extra grip to an excess of enthusiasm and dangerously sharp gravel, all of which took their toll.

Making things worse was the new schedule, with the addition of a sprint race on Saturday. With both practice sessions on Friday deciding who went through to Q2, riders were pushing for fast laps pretty much from the first moment they left the pits on Friday morning. And things went downhill from there.

Silverstone was the first chance the media got to ask the riders on the two big changes to MotoGP made over the summer break. In the second half of the 2023 season, Friday morning practice has been changed to no longer count toward qualifying, and from this race onward, tire pressures will be monitored to be above the minimum set out in the rules, and infractions will be penalized.

The reaction to these two changes was mixed through the paddock. The change to the schedule was welcomed, but few riders felt it would have a significant impact. Johann Zarco was one of the biggest fans of the change. "The Friday morning is easier like this because in case you want to use the soft rear tire for the long race on Sunday, it means it's the only tire that works well," The Pramac Ducati rider said. "And if you have to do a lap time on Friday morning because it can rain on Friday afternoon, you are too limited with the tires."

Having only Friday afternoon practice timed meant you no longer had to worry about the weather, "So at least you don't look at the forecast for the Friday afternoon. You just work on the morning, get this feeling and then you are focused as a qualifying at the end of the practice on Friday afternoon. So less stress and strategy, better with one tire saved," Zarco explained.

Silverstone in summer can be wonderful. Hot, sunny, with long balmy evenings as the heat of the day fades. This is not one of those summers.

Instead, this is a blustery, cool, and wet summer. The first day of practice at Silverstone was dry, but it was cold, and a chill wind sucked the heat out out of everything it touched, including tires fresh out of tire warmers. And that explains the spate of crashes through the day.

The biggest was probably Marco Bezzecchi's. The Mooney VR46 rider put in a fresh soft rear and went out to push for a fast lap. But he pushed too hard too early, his rear tire refusing service at Luffield, and highsiding him into the gravel. He came away relatively unscathed after examination by the medical staff, though he had a big bruise on his leg. He was confident of being able to ride, however.

For a while on Saturday morning, it looked like we were on for a repeat of Silverstone 2018. The race that Sunday was canceled, after torrential rain fell all night and through the morning, and Tito Rabat suffered a horrific broken leg when he crashed due to standing water, and was hit by the Yamaha of Franco Morbidelli, who had also crashed due to standing water, and the rain kept coming and the track never dried. The circuit is still suffering the repercussions of that weekend today, as it slowly wins back the trust of MotoGP fans.

Fortunately, this wasn't a repeat of Silverstone 2018. For a start, the circuit has been resurfaced, and drainage improved. The rain was lighter and less intense, but above all, it eased off occasionally, giving the track a chance to drain. The underlying problem of Silverstone is it is flat as a pancake and sits up above the local area, making it a prime target for any precipitation which just happens to be passing by. And with rains like we saw through Saturday, water can still accumulate faster than it can drain.

It has been a long and eventful weekend, and there will be much to write about this coming week. Including an interview with Lin Jarvis, talking about the decision to sign Alex Rins instead of Franco Morbidelli, what Yamaha is doing to address their problems, and what type of concessions would really make a difference for Yamaha and Honda.

But first, some initial thoughts after a fantastic day of racing, across all three classes. It made a nonsense of British national broadcaster ITV's decision not to show the MotoGP race live, preferring to broadcast a meaningless soccer game. That was bad for ITV, but also bad for MotoGP. Silverstone is one of the tracks that produces fantastic racing, which needs to be seen by as wide an audience as possible. Today's race was the kind of race that will bring in new fans if casual TV viewers get to see it.

I hardly need remind you at this juncture just how bad things are for the Japanese MotoGP manufacturers at the moment. Honda is fourth in the manufacturers standings, just ahead of Yamaha, while both are nearly 70 points behind Aprilia, the factory in third, and 230 points behind leader Ducati.

Repsol Honda is dead last in the team standings, Monster Energy Yamaha at least ahead of most of the satellite teams. Best rider on a Japanese bike is Fabio Quartararo in eleventh, just ahead of Franco Morbidelli in twelfth. Takaaki Nakagami is best Honda rider, way down in seventeenth.

Six time MotoGP champion Marc Marquez has just 15 points, one ahead of Raul Fernandez, universally seen as a disappointment in his second year in MotoGP, and two points ahead of KTM test rider Dani Pedrosa, who scored all his points in just one round at Jerez.

I am not a fan of the Red Bull Ring at Spielberg. It is an overly simplistic circuit – a bunch of straights with an omega in the middle to prevent it from being a basic trapezoid layout, stuck up against a hillside. Because it is basically three long straights and an extended left hander, speeds reached are high, and there is very little runoff. Add in a couple of blind crests where riders have a tendency to crash – the exit of Turn 1, the exit of Turn 3 – and you have a recipe for disaster.

That recipe came terrifyingly close to completion at Turn 3 in 2020. Johann Zarco clipped the front wheel of Franco Morbidelli's Yamaha on the way up the hill toward Turn 3. The bikes were traveling at such a speed that both Zarco's Ducati and Morbidelli's M1 shot across the track at Turn 3, Morbidelli's bike passing in between the Yamahas of Maverick Viñales and Valentino Rossi, Zarco's Ducati flying just over the head of Maverick Viñales.

MotoGP's silly season is simmering just below the surface, that much was plain from Thursday at the Red Bull Ring. Rumors continued to fly around the paddock about who would be riding what, when, and where it might be announced. Some of those rumors even had some basis in fact. But a lot were still down to the feverish imaginations of press and fans.

The most concrete news of all seemed to come from Augusto Fernandez. The GasGas Tech3 rider confirmed that KTM have taken up the option for the second year of his one-plus-one deal, and so the Spaniard will definitely be riding for the Pierer Mobility Group, KTM's parent company. Though he didn't reveal any other details, he did say that he expected news to come out soon. Given KTM's penchant for revealing news at their home grand prix, it seems fair to expect an announcement in the next couple of days. Possibly even by Friday or Saturday.

The safest bet is that Fernandez will be staying put in the GasGas team. The team are impressed by the young Spaniard, especially with his work ethic and approach, and he has been a good ambassador for the GasGas brand, which is aimed at a young Iberian audience.

That will still leave KTM with the Gordian knot of fitting five riders onto what are currently four MotoGP grid slots for 2024. KTM are still pushing to expand their presence from four to six bikes for next year, but and have meetings planned with Dorna to make their case again this weekend.

There are two certainties at the Red Bull Ring: red flags and rain. Friday practice had them both. But then, what did you expect? It's Spielberg after all.

Fortunately, the red flags passed without incident. In the Moto2 P2 session, Manu Gonzalez of the Correos Prepago Yamaha VR46 MasterCamp ran straight on at Turn 4, his bike barreling into the air fence and destroying a sizable section of it. Credit where credit is due, the session was red flagged immediately, to allow the air fence to be replaced. And Gonzalez came away relatively unscathed, passed fit after a brief visit to the medical center.

Gonzalez' crash is a typical affair for the Red Bull Ring. All through the day in all of the classes in Austria, riders were missing braking points and running into the gravel. Most riders just ran on and could recover. Some found themselves unable to stop and crashed, and a few, like Marc Marquez, rain into the gravel and toppled over trying to turn the bike around in the gravel.

As I wrote in my preview for the Austrian Grand Prix on Thursday, something always happens at the Red Bull Ring. It is impossible to have a race here without some kind of unexpected drama unfolding. Although, if it always happens, is it still unexpected?

This Saturday's drama revolved around Jorge Martin and the first corner. A massive pile up there at the start of the sprint race saw Marco Bezzecchi, Miguel Oliveira, and Johann Zarco crash out. Martin got the blame, and was handed a Long Lap Penalty to be served on Sunday.

Was Martin really to blame? Yes and no. A little bit perhaps, though others played a role too. Mostly, though, the causes of the Turn 1 incident run much deeper, and are more troubling than the question of whether a particular rider's approach to the first corner was overly ambitious or not. And they highlight some of the underlying problems with MotoGP.