Quartararo Eighth in Tough British GP Showdown

08-08-2022

Quartararo Eighth in Tough British GP Showdown

Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP’s Fabio Quartararo secured a hard-fought eighth place this weekend, despite having to overcome a long lap penalty, as the MotoGP World Championship resumed at Silverstone.

Defending champion Fabio Quartararo secured eight vital championship points this weekend, as he claimed eighth place at the British Grand Prix.

With a long lap penalty ahead of him, awarded after ‘irresponsible riding at the Dutch GP’, Quartararo launched strongly from his fourth-place grid slot and finished the first lap in second. Pressuring race-leader Johann Zarco up until lap four, the Frenchman dived to the outside of turn 14, completing his penalty flawlessly before re-joining the race in fifth, ahead of Aprilia’s Maverick Viñales.

From there, ‘El Diablo’ had an uphill battle on his hands in what was a seven-rider fight for the lead. Promoted to fourth after a crash for his rival, the 23-year-old pushed on as he looked to make use of his soft front tyre. But things got tricky for Quartararo, who, by the midway stage, had slipped to sixth place.

Continuing to push to match the times of the race leaders, Quartararo looked comfortable as he ticked off the laps but soon came under pressure from Enea Bastianini behind. Trading places, he eventually relinquished his top six position on lap 16 before dropping a further position to Miguel Oliveira in the closing stages, ultimately crossing the line in eighth place, 3.819 seconds behind the winner.

Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP team-mate Franco Morbidelli was confident of a stronger 20-lap race. The Italian was left down the order in Saturday’s qualifying session after struggling with his front tyre in the second stint. However, that didn’t faze the experienced Italian, who charged from 20th to 16th in the opening stages. Picking up two positions by lap ten, he continued to push but quickly became threatened by the Hondas of Takaaki Nakagami and Pol Espargaro. Giving everything, Morbidelli had nothing left, crossing the line in 15th position to secure a championship point.

WithU Yamaha RNF MotoGP Team’s Andrea Dovizioso missed out on a points finish at the British venue. The Italian, who recovered ground in the opening half of the race, battled his way to 16th position. After a promising start, team-mate Darryn Binder ultimately finished the race in 20th.

Limiting the damage done in the championship, Quartararo extends his series lead over Aleix Espargaro by a single point, while Franco Morbidelli sits one point adrift of Alex Marquez in 19th. Dovizioso and Binder lie in 21st and 22nd places respectively.

The MotoGP championship will take a short break before returning to action in Austria for the Austrian Grand Prix on August 19th-21st.

Monster Energy British Grand Prix Results
1. Francesco Bagnaia – Ducati Lenovo Team
2. Maverick Viñales – Aprilia Racing +0.426
3. Jack Miller – Ducati Lenovo Team +0.614
4. Enea Bastianini – Gresini Racing MotoGP +1.651
5. Jorge Martin – Prima Pramac Racing +1.750
6. Miguel Oliveira – Red Bull KTM Factory Racing +2.727
7. Alex Rins – Team SUZUKI ECSTAR +3.021
8. Fabio Quartararo – Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP +3.819
9. Aleix Espargaro – Aprilia Racing +3.958
10. Marco Bezzecchi - Mooney VR46 Racing Team +6.646
11. Brad Binder – Red Bull KTM Factory Racing +7.730
12. Luca Marini - Mooney VR46 Racing Team +13.439
13. Takaaki Nakagami – LCR Honda IDEMITSU +13.706
14. Pol Espargaro – Repsol Honda Team +13.906
15. Franco Morbidelli – Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP +16.359
16. Andrea Dovizioso – WithU Yamaha RNF MotoGP Team +20.805
17. Alex Marquez – LCR Honda CASTROL +21.099
18. Remy Gardner – Tech3 KTM Factory Racing +24.579
19. Stefan Bradl – Repsol Honda Team +28.773
20. Darryn Binder – WithU Yamaha RNF MotoGP Team + 33.653
21. Raul Fernandez – Tech3 KTM Factory Racing +35.601
22. Fabio Di Giannantonio – Gresini Racing MotoGP +36.460
NC. Joan Mir – Team SUZUKI ECSTAR 6 laps
NC. Johann Zarco – Prima Pramac Racing 12 laps

MotoGP 2022 World Championship Standings
1. Fabio Quartararo – Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP 180 points
2. Aleix Espargaro – Aprilia Racing 158 points
3. Francesco Bagnaia – Ducati Lenovo Team 131 points
4. Enea Bastianini – Gresini Racing MotoGP 118 points
5. Johann Zarco – Prima Pramac Racing 114 points
6. Jack Miller – Ducati Lenovo Team 107 points
7. Brad Binder – Red Bull KTM Factory Racing 98 points
8. Alex Rins – Team SUZUKI ECSTAR 84 points
9. Maverick Viñales – Aprilia Racing 82 points
10. Miguel Oliveira – Red Bull KTM Factory Racing 81 points
11. Jorge Martin – Prima Pramac Racing 81 points
12. Joan Mir – Team SUZUKI ECSTAR 77 points
13. Marco Bezzecchi – Mooney VR46 Racing Team 61 points
14. Marc Marquez – Repsol Honda Team 60 points
15. Luca Marini – Mooney VR46 Racing Team 56 points
16. Takaaki Nakagami – LCR Honda IDEMITSU 45 points
17. Pol Espargaro – Repsol Honda Team 42 points
18. Alex Marquez – LCR Honda CASTROL 27 points
19. Franco Morbidelli – Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP 26 points
20. Fabio Di Giannantonio – Gresini Racing MotoGP 18 points
21. Darryn Binder – WithU Yamaha RNF MotoGP Team 10 points
22. Andrea Dovizioso – WithU Yamaha RNF MotoGP Team 10 points
23. Remy Gardner – Tech3 KTM Factory Racing 9 points
24. Raul Fernandez – Tech3 KTM Factory Racing 5 points
25. Stefan Bradl – Repsol Honda Team 0 points
26. Michele Pirro – Aruba.it Racing 0 points
27. Lorenzo Savadori – Aprilia Racing 0 points

Fabio Quartararo

Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP Position: 8th

“I'm not happy about my race. I was just suffering so much. I wasn't having fun. With that medium rear tyre we struggled so much. After the long-lap penalty I was behind four riders and the rear tyre overheated. There was no more performance, and the tyre drops much quicker. So, at that moment our race was gone. I was suffering. I was suffering from this lap to the end.”

Franco Morbidelli

Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP Position: 15th

“There was some progress this weekend, especially in the race. I got a good start and then was able to maintain a decent pace. The tyre choice wasn't the right one, but I prefer not to focus on that. I focused on my riding and the setting. I knew that the front wouldn't last and that the rear was the right one for the race, but I wanted to keep everything like it was in the practice sessions so I could just ride and try things. I have to say that the pace when the tyres were fresh was decent - nothing spectacular but enough to stay up there, so that looks like a step ahead.”

Andrea Dovizioso

WithU Yamaha RNF MotoGP Team Position: 16th

“At the end, we took a bit of a gamble, because we used the hard rear, that we never tried before. But it was the right choice, I think. It was a bit difficult for me at the beginning, because I didn’t try the tyre before, so I couldn’t get up to speed easily and I was not able to use the potential of the bike in the first part of the race. But at the end, I was trying to save the tyre and it was working, I could be consistent until the last lap and that gave me the possibility to make up some positions. Unfortunately, I didn’t get any points, which was our target, but it was very close. But starting from P24 was difficult and with the Qualifying we did to eventually finish in P16 with 20 seconds to the top is a bit better than in the other races.”

Darryn Binder

WithU Yamaha RNF MotoGP Team Position: 20th

"I'm glad to get the first race of the second half of the season done and dusted and see the chequered flag. After Warm Up this morning, I realised that it was going to be a tricky race towards the end. I went with the medium rear, I tried riding the hard during FP2 on Friday but unfortunately I couldn't bring it up to temperature and i didn't feel comfortable riding it, so I felt much more confident on the medium and I went for that. My riding style has always been trying to gain as many positions as I can from the very beginning, I had quite a good pace at the start but the last five laps, I suffered as I didn't have the rear tyre anymore. I've got a starting point that I can build on from here on now and just keep improving for the rest of the season."

Massimo Meregalli

Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP, Team Director

“We had hoped for more today. Fabio perfectly stuck to the plan. He had a very strong start from the second row and was second place when he took the long-lap penalty. The penalty clearly had a big impact on his race. It cost him three positions, and he was unlucky that it happened right at the moment when the pack were all very close together. From that moment we started to experience a drop of the rear tyre. Unfortunately, we never had that before in the practice sessions leading up to the race. In hindsight, we would now choose to use the hard rear. In the end, Fabio made the most of a bad situation. Franky had a strong start to the race, which helped him get into the points. It was a shame that the medium rear tyre drop at the end lost him two places, but it‘s still a small improvement, so we will leave this race behind us now and focus on getting ready for Austria in two weeks‘ time.”

Razlan Razali

WithU Yamaha RNF MotoGP Team, Founder and Team Principal

“It was a difficult race. However, Andrea showed a good recovery to be just outside the points in 16th, right behind Franky (Morbidelli). Darryn seemed to be struggling a bit more. He had a tough weekend overall. Therefore, it was a relatively ok weekend for Dovi after his retirement announcement. We just have to keep going and look forward to Austria now.”