It doesn’t matter who you support, the American MotoGP race at the Circuit of the Americas was really about one rider: Alex Rins. Second in the sprint race and winning the main race, both times battling with Bagnaia are measures not only of the rider but also the bike.
The thing I loved about Sunday’s race was not that it was non-stop action all the way, but that it was a different kind of tension: a tension where you see leading riders make mistakes and wonder if the man who inherits the lead can hold it together under the pressure he is putting on himself to win, not to mention pressure from behind.
I desperately wanted Rins to win, not because I am a particularly big fan, but for the overall health of the sport: the more winners we have in a season that is supposed to be a Ducati whitewash/walkover, the better.
Right from the start of both races, Rins was staying with Bagnaia: satellite Honda versus factory Ducati at a time when the factory Repsol Hondas are nowhere. COTA is, of course, Marquez territory but would he have been able to take the fight to Bagnaia as well as Rins did? Of course, there’s no telling what might have happened, although we have to remember that Rins is a four-time winner here as well, including twice now in MotoGP, so what happened shouldn’t have come as a surprise.
For too long we’ve been listening to Marquez bemoaning the state of the Honda but Rins showed that age-old truth that what is bad for one rider can be good for another: it is the slim chance of putting the right rider on the right bike at the right time and it’s happened throughout the history of the sport, more noticeably in the last twenty years: Rossi on the Yamaha, Stoner on the Ducati, Rins and Mir on the Suzuki: all taking an in-the-doldrums manufacturer and propelling it to the top. If further evidence is needed, you only have to look at the failure of Rossi on the Ducati or Lorenzo on the Honda. Bikes that, put into other hands, were almost unbeatable but that even those two greats couldn’t master.
In America, all the Ducatis were strong – when they stayed on the track, that is – but the other manufacturers also had strong races. Jack Miller ran as high as second on the KTM in the main race, only to crash out. Quartararo’s Yamaha at least allowed him to fight hard to maintain his podium position, despite the attention of Marini on the VR46 Ducati. In the Sprint race, Aleix Espargaro crashed out early on but in the main race, he was up to second before finishing fourth, despite throwing everything at a desperate last-lap attempt to wrestle third from Jorge Martin. Brad Binder finished fifth in the sprint race but crashed out of the main race, re-mounting to finish 13th and at least gain some points. Binder was the last finisher, COTA being a bruising race for nine riders.
Bagnaia showed in the sprint race that, when he manages to not crash, he will be hard to beat in a straight fight, especially at a circuit where there are straights worth their name: Ducati power is still dominant. But he’s continuing his 2022 habit of crashing too much and he can’t count on being able to stage a comeback yet again later in the season. His fall in the main race handed the race on a plate to Rins who, if we are realistic, was never going to beat Bagnaia in a straight fight, despite being able to keep the Ducati close company throughout the lap but, as the saying goes, to finish first, first you must finish. Rins finished, but Bagnaia didn’t. It’s as simple as that.
The problem for Bagnaia is that he doesn’t understand why he crashed: “I don’t know what happened,” said Bagnaia. “Sincerely, I don’t know how many laps I did this weekend. Maybe 80, maybe 100. Pushing, controlling, understanding… And then in the race when I was in total control, I crashed.
“So I’m very angry, not with myself, because I’m 100% sure that wasn’t my fault today. In Argentina, I recognise that I was a bit on the limit. But today, no. Today something happened, but not in terms of a cold tyre or the wind. Something we have to understand from the bike.”
Bagnaia went on to say that perhaps his Ducati is too good, too stable and that he is unable to feel when the tyres are at their limit because of this stability. I don’t know about you but that’s the first time I’ve heard a rider saying that his bike is too good!
“Maybe it has too much (feedback) filter because it’s so stable,” he added. “Maybe we have to lose a bit of this stability, to lose a bit of filter, just to be more (feeling) on the tyres.”
You can take nothing away from Alex Rins, though. He applied pressure to Bagnaia right from the start and you have to think that this was a factor in Bagnaia’s downfall, even though the Ducati man had resisted that same pressure in the sprint race. Rins was simply perfect the whole weekend and a win and a second place just reward for both him and the LCR Honda team, scoring their first win since Crutchlow in Argentina at the beginning of the 2018 season.
Mainly, however, Rins’ victory was so satisfying because it continues a tradition that has long been a part of MotoGP: that of satellite teams often being in with a shout at victory. Bezzecchi in the last race and now Rins in this, are just the latest in a long line of Davids slaying the Goliaths that are the factory teams and adding a lot of spice and colour to the results sheets. You’d have to say that it is more likely than ever for this to happen often this year, with the number of Ducatis on the grid, all of them fast and all of them with very hungry riders on board. A world championship might not be on the cards but, as this weekend showed, anything is possible in MotoGP.
The really big question, however, is this: if the races are this good without the likes of Marquez and Bastianini, what will they be like when they are back in the saddle?
