hardly a well deserved champion with somebody deliberately blocking other riders and a kangaroo court making Rossi start from the back of the grid especially given that Lorenzo passed on a yellow flag in a race and was allowed to get away with it. had Lorenzo won on a level playing field it would have been a well deserved win and championship but it was not a level playing field and opinions will be split as to how this effected the end result F1 got tainted years ago with team orders deciding races and Marquez has lowered motogp to the same deplorable level - a truly pitiful and sorry end to what could have been a great season ruined by a spoil sport Marquez who is more interested in spoiling races than winning them
You haven't responded to my question. If you think I'm wrong, then give me reason for thinking different. You could of course just dismiss this question by saying I know nothing about bike racing. I posted my thinking 24 hours before I read the earler post by @damodici quoting Motomatters.com. It's a very well written piece, and I'll quote a section below. Please explain why you think it's wrong, or does this guy no nothing about racing? Despite Rossi's brilliant early laps – and they were truly things of beauty, passes executed with surgical and ruthless precision – his race pace was simply not up to that of the front three. Lorenzo and Márquez ran laps of between 1'31.5 and 1'31.9 just about all race long. Pedrosa ran laps of 1'31.7, lost ground as he slowed up with an overheating front tire to clock a string of 1'31.9s and 1'32s, before upping the pace again and hitting a 1'31.5 to catch the leaders. Rossi, meanwhile, was running consistent 1'32.1 and 1'32.2. Fast enough for fourth, but nowhere near good enough for the win. Even if Rossi had started from the front row of the grid, and not had to fight his way forward through the pack (a battle which was over shortly after one third distance), he did not have the pace to beat Lorenzo, nor even the pace to beat the two Hondas. Rossi finished where his race pace dictated, regardless of where he had started. That race pace was roughly in line with what he had shown during practice, a couple of tenths short of the pace of the leaders.
Rossi was over 10 seconds behind by the time he got past the rest of the field,and as good a rider as he is,he was never going to bridge that gap in the dry. And with umpteen years of racing experience behind him,he almost certainly realised that fourth was the best he was going to get,so exactly what would have been the point in destroying his tyres,(and risking his position),in a lost cause? Had he done so,and dropped out of the top six as a consequence,then all hope was lost.In the event that MM and DP then passed JL no doubt he would have been derided for that. His championship was in the hands of others. Also,(and I have raced myself,albeit only in off road competition),there is nothing like seeing your nearest competitors within possible catching distance.Rossi may well have been,(like I always was),spurred on to greater efforts when I thought I could beat those who I considered of similar standard. No one can state categorically what would have happened if Rossi had started in his "proper" qualifying position.He may have done a Schumacher and punted Lorenzo into the weeds,or he may have harried Jorge into making a mistake,or MM might have gone for it,or countless other scenarios. The writer states his opinion.He has not won nine world titles,and he is not VR,therefore he does not know why VR chose to do what he did and the speed he chose to ride at. Yet another opinion...and to be honest,I'd just as soon read yours as I would his :grin:
All the years of bullying by Rossi and the young pretender Marquez is the first one to break him. Rossi simply does not know how to handle this situation as he has never experienced it before. He made his bed, now he is lied in it. End of story.
VR has lost championships that have gone down to the wire before and had bad blood with riders that had more raw speed than him. Something feels different this time and I'm not sure what it is. Whether it is huge frustration manifesting itself as he knew this may be the last shot whereas there was always time before or people behind the scenes working him up, I just don't know. I genuinely think VR is convinced there is funny business whether there was or not and this is not a mind game. it's gone on too long and cut too deep. I know that there was a lot of goings on in the pits at Sepang before VR even got back from the race so the blood was up in his entourage and that won't have helped. My mind swings day on day to MM being a bemused bystander thinking WTF, to a calculated attempt to de throne VR and VR having a genuine case to having lost the plot when an attempt to clip the wings of MM failed. Maybe time will tell but not sure we will ever really know the answer. It seems to me that there are circumstances to fit all scenarios if everyone looks at them with complete honesty.
Taken from Bike Magazine FB page..................... Think Marquez held back? Here's a Lorenzo quote from after Valencia: “The hardest part of the race was to see Pedrosa get very close. I thought I would run the risk of ending up third and lost the Championship, but in the end, they surely realized that there was a lot at stake for me, maybe in another type of race they could risk more and pass me. Instead they were very good because the title would remain in Spain (…) I always try to be honest, the truth is that I did a race in which I gave my best always, however sincerely today the Honda, it was very difficult to always keep the concentration and stand in front of them. They are Spanish like me and knew what was at stake, so I benefited because maybe without that little help, maybe considering that Valentino did a great race comeback from last to fourth place, he could win the Championship. So this title is mine, it is ours, but also of Spain.” Hmmmmmm..........
In all fairness if that's what Jorge thought , you cant attribute the same thoughts to Marquez and Pedrosa
It was pretty obvious to me that MM was holding back, hell he even shoved pedrosa out of the way when it looked like he could go on to win it. Was I surprised, no. Would MM have helped Lorenzo had Rossi not bad mouthed him so much, who knows.
I still think there is a difference between deliberately going out of your way to help Lorenzo to a title and not attacking him with a risky manoeuvre for a race win. If it had been someone else, MM would have tried this, I think, but with the risk of flooring Lorenzo in Spain, it wasn't really worth the candle for him. It wouldn't have made any difference to his championship. Getting frisky with your team mate is another matter: nothing was at stake, so no risk. You don't want your team mate beating you. I don't know one way or the other - how could I? But I suspect that VR is over-reacting.
It seems to me that Rossi believes he can control racers with his mind games, the way he used to control races with his racing ability. He miscalculated hugely. All in my opinion. Furthermore ... Marquez acted wrongly and dangerously at Sepang, whereas Rossi forgot that racing properly takes place on the track, not in the media. I don't believe that Marquez's answer to Rossi's unfounded allegations in respect of Phillip Island should have been made during the actual Sepang race, that was inappropriate and unworthy of Marquez. Marquez should either have refuted the allegations verbally/in the press, or, better yet, ignored them. In summary, Rossi acted foolishly. Marquez acted irresponsibly and dangerously, at Sepang, and unsportingly at Valencia. Both racers are diminished, with their reputations tarnished, Marquez more so than Rossi. Sorted, let's move on
"Instead they were very good because the title would remain in Spain... ...They are Spanish like me and knew what was at stake...So this title is mine, it is ours, but also of Spain.” ...yep....who knows...
