PostedSeptember 15, 2022, 10:30 PM
MotorcyclingMarc Márquez, a long-awaited return
The eight-time Spanish world champion returns to service in Aragón. To gauge yourself, but also to prepare for 2023.
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- Jean Claude Schertenleib
“Honestly, following Mugello, when I left for the United States to undergo this fourth operation on my right arm, I did not think that I might try to race in Aragón. But it turns out that everything worked perfectly, right from the surgery. Today, the bones are consolidated, but I still lack a lot of musculature, because for almost two years, the bones and muscles of the right part of my body were working in an abnormal position. My goal, coming back now, is to try to finish all the races; to know where I really am physically, but also to prepare for 2023. I know that the task will be complex, with five races in six weeks, including the first three in a row. Things are clear with my team: if I understand, in the middle of the Japanese GP weekend, or in Thailand, that it’s too much, I will stop ”: the return of Marc Márquez is indeed the attraction of this weekend in Aragon.
Quote of the day: Marc Márquez
“It’s not up to me to organize the giant company that is Honda”
The fact remains that for several weeks, the eight-time world champion has been very present in discussions concerning the future of the MotoGP project of the largest manufacturer in the world. In Misano, ten days ago, Márquez and Nakagami tested a European swingarm, signed Kalex, the majority supplier of the Moto2 class.
Quartararo: a clef weekend
Fabio Quartararo’s lead in the world championship standings is now 30 points over “Pecco” Bagnaia, winner of the last four GPs to date and who remembers that it was here, in Aragón, that he won the his first MotoGP race last year, following an extraordinary duel with Marc Márquez. For Quartararo, it’s a key weekend since the Aragón layout should logically penalize his Yamaha – acceleration from first gear to sixth, very long straight line, data that corresponds perfectly to the many (8) Ducati.
A crazy program
This GP of Aragón is the first of a series of five in the space of six weeks. We will indeed be driving in Japan next weekend, then in Thailand the following day. After an “off” Sunday (October 9), MotoGP will head to Phillip Island (Australia) before taking a very active break in Malaysia on the way back to Europe. Where the final of the championship will take place, as always, the Ricardo Tormo circuit in Cheste, near Valencia (the weekend of November 6).
Grid 2023: it’s (almost) complete
The Japanese Takaaki Nakagami has been confirmed for an additional season in the Honda-LCR team, where his new team will be Alex Rins. If the passage from Moto2 to the MotoGP class of Ai Ogura has long been topical, Honda finally preferred to trust one more year to Nakagami, a pilot who already knows the RC213V. The puzzle is therefore complete (Bezzecchi and Marini have also been confirmed in the VR46 team in recent days), with one exception: the Spaniard Augusto Fernández, who is playing for the Moto2 world title with Ogura, has not yet been made official in the team GasGas Tech3, but it is he who will ride alongside Pol Espargaró.
Gardner in Superbikes. With Aegerter?
It’s now official: following just one season in MotoGP, in Hervé Poncharal’s KTM Tech3 team, the reigning Moto2 world champion, Australian Remy Gardner, will leave the paddock at the end of the season to join the World Superbike. He has signed a contract with the GRT Yamaha team (which this year includes American Garrett Gerloff and Japanese Kohta Nozane) and his teammate should be Dominique Aegerter. “Domi” brought back from Magny-Cours – where he increased his Supersport World Championship lead over Lorenzo Baldassari – a contract in good standing, a contract on which he continues to work. The signing should occur in the coming days.
It moves around Tom
The CFMoto 2023 team with riders Xavi Artigas (3rd from left), Joel Kelso (4th from left) and Tom Lüthi (2nd from r).
LDD
It had been in the air for several months: the Spaniard Carlos Tatay will not continue his story with the CFMoto team of Tom Lüthi next year. He will be replaced by the young Australian Joel Kelso (20 years old), whom we discovered last year during a few GPs and who will be playing his first full season in 2022 with the CIP team of Alain Bronec (22nd in the intermediate classification of the championship, a 9th place in Portugal for best result). Xavi Artigas, he will still be under the orders of the former world champion: “I am still convinced that he can fight regularly in front. I’m waiting for the click, “says Lüthi, who also has to manage changes in his technical staff (Massimo Cappana, a technical manager who has been operating in the paddock for more than thirty years, has left the team.)
