Photo courtesy Motogp.com
Yamaha has appealed the decision by Race Direction at the Malaysian Motorcycle Grand Prix to assess three penalty points to Valentino Rossi for his clash with Marc Marquez. Rossi appeared to deliberately run into Marquez as they fought for third early in Sunday’s Malaysian Grand Prix, causing the Honda rider to crash out.
Those three points, combined with another penalty point Rossi was given for balking his teammate Jorge Lorenzo during qualifying at Misano, means that Rossi now has four penalty points on the season, which results in him starting from the back of the grid in the next race.
According to MotoGP Race Director Mike Webb, Movistar Yamaha has already appealed the decision and race stewards will now listen to Yamaha’s appeal and make a decision.
“The decision is that Race Direction has imposed three penalty points on Valentino Rossi for irresponsible riding, that is, deliberately causing contact,” Webb explained to MotoGP.com. “Deliberately running wide in a corner in order to try and force another rider off line. The result was a crash and so it’s irresponsible riding causing a crash and for that we have imposed three penalty points on Rossi.
“It looked like we were going to have a great race, but unfortunately it ended in an incident that’s controversial. I have to say that the Movistar Yamaha team have appealed against Race Direction’s decision, so now that appeal will be heard by FIM stewards.”
Webb explained what happens next in the appeal process.
“The FIM stewards here at the race will hear the appeal. There is a time limit of 30 minutes to lodge an appeal, that’s been done. The appeal is underway and they will hear it as soon as possible within the next 30 minutes.
“If Yamaha are not happy with the steward’s decision, they have five days to lodge an appeal with the FIM International Disciplinary Court. So they have five days and then the FIM lawyers get involved to have another hearing.”
A bit of a review on MotoGP penalty points – Race Direction can impose between 1 and 10 points for each infringement. Points accumulate with automatic sanctions kicking in once a rider reaches 4 points (start next race from last place), 7 points (start next race from pit lane) and 10 points (disqualification from next race).
Penalty points are in no way linked to riders’ championship points.
Additional punishments available to Race Direction include fines, ride through, grid or time penalties, suspension, disqualification or exclusion.
Rossi, who did not attend the post-race press conference, said through his press agent the following: “You know unfortunately I lose a lot of time with Marc and in Turn 14 I tried to go wide to get a better line to make him slow because he just rides to cause me some problems. Unfortunately he came to me and I think he crashed in that moment. It’s a shame because I think that in a normal race we can stay and fight with Jorge and we lost some more points. In Valencia will be more difficult.”
