Penalties Protocol

By janemarr |
MotoGP, Moto2, Moto3, MotoE

I'm an academic at the University of London, currently writing a paper on Moto GP Stewards' decision-making and how it comports with principles of Administrative Law. I won't bore you further with the content but, as a Moto GP fan, it's been by far the most exciting thing I've researched in years! I've been trying to unearth a copy of the penalties protocol issued (to teams) on 30 March and have come up empty handed. The FIM website, in particular, seems to have turned smoke and mirrors into some sort of art form. The protocol is mentioned in the Marquez appeal decision but concerning the broad principle rather than the nitty gritty. In stewards' penalty notifications subsequent to the protocol being issued, there's consistent reference to 'types' of incidents - type 2b; type 3 etc. These incident types don't seem to map specifically to the FIM regulations so I imagine they have come from the protocol.  Would anybody here be able to suggest where I might try to obtain a copy of it? TIA.

... the teams and riders have been asking similar questions for a year or three now.  The decisions seem more like the result of a random answer generator.  I wish you the best of luck finding signal amongst the noise! :)  We'd all be most interested if you find something out though!  Post back here some day with a link presuming the paper is published openly.  Maybe also a lot of journos would be very interested including our revered DE.

From what I can tell Dorna has kept the penalties system totally secret since Sepang 2015.  A podcast recently said that prior to that, journos could just rock up to Mike Webb and ask why this decision or that was made and would get an answer which usually made sense of something which otherwise didn't.  Since the incident/s in 2015 the points system was scrapped, the decision-making expanded to a panel of three but there is total strict silence regarding their decisions.  That in itself makes for a potentially interesting paper - the influence of power and money (ie apex-athletes in a sport which is ultimately about entertainment) on the application of punishment.

 

↑Back to top