Michael Scott | September 15, 2021
Cycle News In The Paddock
COLUMN
Marquez and the Danger Factor
It seems I am not the only one who is getting scared by Marc Marquez. The wounded genius, according to British road-racing legend John McGuinness, is currently a danger to himself and to other riders, and a liability to Honda.
Writing in the veteran (and indeed last surviving) British motorcycle weekly MCN, McGuinness notes his accident rate, underlined by yet another first-lap mishap in the British GP.
Marc admitted himself he’d overcooked the optimism, in a wild move on Jorge Martin that took both of them down and out before they’d even completed half a lap of Silverstone.
As almost always, thanks to awesomely good safety gear and plenty of run-off, they both got away with it uninjured. But when it comes to pushing your luck, statistics confirm what common sense dictates—the less times you fall off, the less likely you are to get hurt.
Marquez is doubly under pressure.
Most of all, from himself. Nobody can achieve what he has without driving himself to the absolute limit, constantly. No let-up.
His skill and courage remain unquestionable, and on a track that favors him physically—mainly left-hand corners putting less stress on his still weak and painful right shoulder and upper arm—he can show it. Hence the win in Sachsenring, and also his potential at Aragon and COTA, where he has been dominant in the past.
But the fact of physical weakness remains, no matter how much he would like to ignore it.
Then there’s the pressure from Honda. Over the past few years, they have painted themselves into a corner. With a single genius rider, they have developed their bike around his very unique style. It has proved increasingly harder for other riders to achieve success on the mighty RC213V over recent years. As shown last year when he was absent. Not a single win and just two podiums—both highly uncharacteristic second places for the plucky but still inexperienced class rookie Alex Marquez.
Relying on Marc Marquez alone was always high risk and remains so, not least because the maestro might be showing signs of what might be dubbed the Rossi Syndrome. He is still only 28, but he is jaded by injury, and now younger riders are pushing him into areas he’s never needed to linger before. Hasn’t stopped him from trying, yet—but it’s getting painful.
Look at the crash list. In spite of missing the first two races, Marc’s 16 crashes so far are more than any other rider in all three classes. (Next up, teammate Pol Espargaro, struggling to master the handful Honda, with 15.)
Marc has always been prone to minor tumbles, mainly low-siders in practice, when seeking the limit. This year, so many have been big crashes, including a monster at Assen, and now another at Silverstone, at 170 mph. To say he was lucky to escape with nothing more than grit in his eye understates the case.
He’s also crashed out of three races: Le Mans, Mugello and Catalunya. And in Austria, though he was able to remount and finish in the points.
Then another race crash at Silverstone, on the first lap, “too optimistic,” he explained apologetically. “Races are sometimes like this. Today it was me who made the mistake.”
Yes, but also the same mistake on the first corner at the restarted Styrian GP two races ago, twice. On each occasion, he barged into an increasingly disgruntled Aleix Espargaro.
Is this a symptom of a rider who, for all the wrong reasons, is too far out of his comfort zone (one hesitates to say, of such a huge talent, out of his depth)? Or is it simply having to try too hard on a bike still short of the standard set by the ever-improving opposition?
This is not contradicted by Repsol team chief Alberto Puig, who freely admits they have problems to solve. Frozen engine development is just one obstacle, but chassis balance remains elusive, and the bike is more of a handful on tracks with poor grip. Which is today, most of them once the tires go down.
Marquez identified the cause of earlier crashes as needing to push too hard, especially under braking, and of the Assen crash as an electronic glitch that bamboozled the traction control—an undignified system failure for a leading team.
Fellow Repsol rider Pol has consistently complained that, with no previous data, limited pre-season testing and an opaque teammate reluctant to share meaningful information. “I don’t know if the problem is me, the settings, or the bike.”
He could thus hail pole at Silverstone, four laps in the lead, and a strong fifth place as a breakthrough.
The forthcoming races will show whether or not this is premature, whether or not Honda has dug themselves out of their hole.CN
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