Winners
Brad Binder
Apparently Joan Mir won the MotoGP championship last year. Few remember that without the aid of Wikipedia. However few will ever forget this race and how Brad Binder made the almost-impossible possible.
Brad has a strict regime that he usually sticks to each round:
- Be nowhere in practice
- Qualify woefully
- Work his way up in the race
- Finish top six
- Wait for everyone to say “if only he’d qualified in the top ten”.
Like shooting giraffes it’s a tradition Binder loves to adhere to. But this time the KTM rider slipped up and ended up qualifying in the top ten…just. This meant that there was a chance he’d be able to catch the leaders before the race ended.
So, as predicted, moments before the rain started Bradley had indeed finally caught the lead group. But the second he did the lead group all headed somewhere else – leaving the South African alone like the fat kid with the annoying voice and exaggerated tails wanting to join the group of other children.
Now by himself and riding on a wet track with smooth tyres Binder the Elder found himself riding around as fast as he dared wondering when the none-fat-kids were going to blast past him. But they never did and the South African slipped his way to his second MotoGP victory.
Us
Last week we were forced to watch a dull MotoGP race. I mean you’d expect it in Moto2 of course – but not MotoGP as well. Sure the result was interesting but not the racing.
None of that this week. From the start to the very last corner of the last lap it was a rollercoaster of excitement, confusion and spectacular uncertainty . What kind of amazingly random casserole of nonsense could, momentarily at least, allow us to believe that Rossi was about to land a podium?
Even before the rain we were treated to some fine racing. Bagnaia was looking calm as he led the pack searching for his first MotoGP win. Behind him Marc Marquez was stressing the Rossi fans with his speed as he battled the army of Ducatis. And we also had lone-Yamaha hero Fabio Quartararararo pulling off some frankly insane outside overtaking manoeuvres. It was everything last week wasn’t.
Then rain, mixed with the VR46 tears, hit the track and caused brilliant chaos. It was almost like a predetermined Formula E style rule designed to mix-up the racing and artificially add excitement…only there was nothing artificial about this.
The final four laps were far better than I can ever explain. So I won’t bother.
Teeth
Fabio Quartarararo’s riding has been nothing short of sensational this season. His, grin, however less so. For all his cash Fabio’s gnashers don’t yet seem to have been upgraded so come parc ferme we’re forced to observe his socially distancing teeth during his winner’s interviews and wonder if they were designed by someone who had only ever heard about teeth but ever actually seen them.
Sure he could eat corn on the cob through a picket fence but could we, the suffering public, have some better dental visuals at least once?
Thankfully our prayers were answered as this time we had Brad Binder and his gorgeous smile rightfully taking pride and place after the race. Unlike Fabio he’s a guy that doesn’t need to floss with a mattress. Gleaming and built up strong from years of tackling biltong his pearly whites looked magnificent as he grinned his way through the press conferences.
Stunning!
Losers
Johann Zarco
This really looked like Johann’s weekend. You’ve voted for him almost every race as your predicted winner and the way he was riding in practice it looked like he would finally reward all our spammers who have week-on-week put their faith in him.
But slowly the wheels fell off his charge…then he fell off.
As a dejected Zarco limped back to the pits with a face like overly ruptured creme brulee the popular Frenchman (for a Frenchman) could see his once-strong second place in the championship standings drop to fourth.
Ángel Viñales
Father of the disgraced Maverick has this week found himself taking on the mighty noodle-fuelled army of Yamaha singlehandedly. Ángel raged that Yamaha had purposely sabotaged Mav’s bike last weekend to stop him beating the favoured-Fabio. To validate his claims yet more Senior Viñales waved his pointed finger around menacingly a lot and chose to spray ‘anger-saliva’ around when on a rant.
Finally, when everyone was way-past caring, Ángel confidentially predicted that when his son spoke out about what had actually happened “the truth would be finally revealed”.
Sadly when Maverick did speak to the press he just said sorry and admitted he got a bit angry…making his father look a bit of a chump. Angry and foolish? That’s DNA for you.
Marc Marquez
How long does it take to recover from a shoulder injury?
Factually speaking Marc Marquez was partially to blame for the treacherous conditions that all the riders encountered in Austria – his brutal charge towards the front of the race saw the yellow sections of the spectators squirt salty tears of dread at the possible outcome. When the rain finally came everyone in the known universe then nodded sagely knowing that Marc would now be in a class of his own.
Sadly he wasn’t in a class of his own. Instead he was dumped into the ‘class of Crutchlow’ as the once-great Spaniard crashed out again blaming his shoulder. But was it really? Or has he actually lost some of his magical ability?