The bikes are boxed away, the teams are home with their families, and the riders are off doing motorcross and playing video games, based off what I see on Twitter. The 2020 MotoGP season is finally done, and as we head into the off-season and begin preparing for next year’s racing, I thought it would be a good time to look back on the season that was. With the power of hindsight, it seems like a good time to reflect on how we got here, so here we go.
Today’s blog will be talking about everything that happened between the Qatar grand prix and the Brno round, while part 2 will cover the double headers in Austria and Misano. Part 3 will involve the races between Catalunya and Teruel, and then the final part will take us home with the Valencia double header and the finale in Portimao.
Empty sheds and a global outbreak
Of course, way back in March, the 2020 season was supposed to get underway under the floodlights in Qatar. The MotoGP teams headed in two weeks early to compete in their final pre-season test of the year, before heading back home for a final period of rest and respite before the season kicked off. The Moto2 and Moto3 riders followed them in a week later for their testing, awaiting the return of the premier class in the days before the opening grand prix of the season.
The MotoGP teams never arrived. As the world was rocked by the rapid spread of the COVID-19 virus, Qatar closed down it’s borders, and the premier class found themselves unable to enter the country to compete in their first race of the year. The Moto2 and Moto3 teams were able to put on a show without their more senior counterparts, but the writing was on the wall, and as fans across the world held bated breaths, Dorna and the FIM began postponing and cancelling races.
In March, we lost the races to be held in Thailand, America, Argentina and Jerez. April took Le Mans, Mugello, Catalunya, Germany, the Netherlands and Finland. The global pandemic had hit full swing, and with countries going into hard lockdown to attempt to combat the virus, there was seldom time or resources to plan a weekend of motorcycle racing. Throughout all this, the men and women in charge of the MotoGP continued to promise one thing: if there was any chance that we could have a season of racing, we would.
By July we finally had the answer. The MotoGP class would face a condensed 14-round season, keeping the racing contained within European tracks, and would include a number of back-to-back races at the same circuits. The catch? There would be just 18 weeks to complete these races. This was in no way going to be an average season – this was to be a marathon, a battle of endurance rather than raw skill. It would also be a season held on a knife edge, as there could be no guarantees that COVID wouldn’t cause the racing to end prematurely at any given time. Still, it was a moment to be hopeful as a fan.
Starting with a bang
So by the time we finally began our first full race weekend in Jerez, it came with a lot of nervous energy, as well as a lot of important questions needing answering. The Yamahas and Suzukis had looked strongest during preseason testing – could they deliver come race day? Would Marc Marquez repeat his incredible success last year and romp his way to a ninth world title? Had KTM and Aprilia finally produced machines that could compete with the top dogs of MotoGP?
Unfortunately, reality hit hard that weekend. Both Alex Rins and Cal Crutchlow were ruled out of the weekend’s events due to crashes in qualifying and practice, shortening the field to just twenty riders and putting a damper on either rider’s hopes of a championship challenge. Marquez qualified on the front row, exactly where he likes to be, with the Yamahas of Quartararo and Vinales the only ones able to go faster. The KTMs impressed in qualifying, with Pol Espargaro managing P6 and his rookie teammate Brad Binder taking a shock P13 (which became P11 with Rins and Crutchlow out of the running). With a chaotic-looking midpack and some strong title contenders right at the front, we looked set for a great race to kick things off.
What we got was more of a battle for survival than anything else. Marquez and Vinales got the best starts and began to duel out front, with a string of riders following them led by Quartararo. Binder pushed up to seventh and was looking impressive, but missed his braking markers and was forced to work his way from the back of the pack. Then Marc Marquez did something rather uncharacteristic and made a mistake of his own, running through the gravel and rejoining way down the order. He had the pace to be at the front, and as the lap ticked down it became clear that he was a man on a mission, as he began picking his way through the pack.
As Marc began disposing of the riders in his path, Quartararo got to the front and began disappearing. Vinales stayed firm in second, despite a number of strong riders behind him, including the Ducatis of Jack Miller and Andrea Dovizioso. Valentino Rossi was forced to retire with an engine issue, but was not the only casualty by this point; both Aleix Espargaro and Joan Mir had already bit the dust, crashing in the opening laps. Iker Lecuona was forced to retire from his first race as a MotoGP rider as the heat got to him, and Marc finally reached the leaders after an incredible hunt through the fourteen-odd riders between.
Then disaster struck again for the World Champion. Only moments after taking second place from Vinales, Marquez had a massive highside, his tires giving way and launching him over the handlebars. It was a big, nasty crash, and it delivered us with an unbelievable end to the first race of the year: Quartararo took his first win, with Vinales and Dovizioso taking the remaining spots on the podium. Miller managed a close fourth, while Pol Espargaro showed the competitiveness of this year’s KTM to take sixth. And the reigning champion spent the evening in hospital, with no points and a huge shadow cast over his chances at another title.
Two from two
The racing community barely had enough time to digest the events of the Jerez race, as just five days later we were back at it for the Andalusian grand prix. Since there was no precedent for racing at the same track two weeks running in modern day MotoGP, we were entering a relative unknown. Teams and riders were no longer starting from scratch in FP1; they had an entire weekend’s worth of data already available to them, and could use that as a solid foundation to build off of. The biggest news? Marc Marquez returned to the circuit just days after surgery on his arm, fully intending to take part in practice and qualifying on Saturday, and hold on to his hopes of a title defence.
Marc rode in FP3, but it was a poor choice on his part. The metal plates that were holding his bones together did not take nicely to being thrown around the Jerez circuit at high speeds, and he was forced to retire, and later pull out of Sunday’s race. He wasn’t the only injured member of the paddock, either, as both Rins and Crutchlow made brave returns to racing after their injuries the weekend before. Quartararo took pole again, ahead of Vinales and a surprising Pecco Bagnaia, who took his first front row start since stepping up to the premier class. The focus for the riders was clear: the World Champion was absent, and down as many as fifty points. Anyone who could take advantage of this would be in great shape for a run at the title come November.
Quartararo got the best start, and began disappearing once again. A slew of riders gave chase once again, though the fallers came quicker and heavier than the week before. Oliveira, Lecuona, Aleix Espargaro, Miller, Petrucci and Binder were all caught out as the beating Spanish sun claimed victim after victim. Then there were engine troubles: Morbidelli was forced to pull out after riding the best race of his career, and in a heartbreaking moment Bagnaia was forced to do the same just minutes after taking P2 en route to his first ever MotoGP podium.
In the end, Quartararo was never really challenged, and departed from Jerez with a perfect score of 50 points. Vinales managed to maintain second place, and Valentino Rossi took his 199th career podium in third. An incredible ride from Takaaki Nakagami saw him rise to fourth in both the race and the overall standings, and Mir rescued some valuable points for the Suzuki team after their nightmare opener. Quartararo had officially made his mark in Jerez, and as we headed for Brno he looked like a firm title contender.
The rookie sensation
The grand prix of the Czech Republic introduced us to a concept that would become recurring throughout the season: No-one can predict what will happen in 2020 MotoGP. Johann Zarco, on a year old Ducati, spent the weekend circulating near the top of the timesheets, and come Saturday afternoon made an incredible effort in order to put himself on pole position. This was an incredible result for the Frenchman, who had gone through the season from hell in 2019 with the factory KTM team. He was joined on the front row by the Petronas pairing of Quartararo and Morbidelli, with Quartararo looking to continue his form from Jerez and Morbidelli trying to banish his demons from Andalusia.
Morbidelli got the best start of the race, and though both Quartararo and Zarco looked in good form, they had a surprise attack coming in the form of the KTM factory duo. In a complete shock of form, both Pol Espargaro and Brad Binder came charging through the pack, and Binder managed to get himself all the way up into P2 and began hunting down race leader Morbidelli. Espargaro found himself in a duel with Zarco and Quartararo, while the likes of Rins and Oliveira began their own steady progressions through the field.
Binder eventually did catch Morbidelli, going late on the brakes to slide his KTM past and into the lead. Zarco and Espargaro had a coming together that left Pol in the gravel and Zarco with a long lap penalty – a penalty that he took with exceptional style, using his knee to glide through the corner and lose minimal time. While all of South Africa and the KTM squad held their breaths, Binder starting pulling away at the front. The rookie was untouchable for the rest of the race, showing control and rhythm that hadn’t been seen before on a KTM or by any rookie since Marc Marquez.
Binder took a historic win, the first South African to do so in the premier class, and the first rookie since Marquez to take to the top step of the podium. Morbidelli was forced to settle for second, still his first MotoGP podium, and Zarco took an incredible third on his 2019 spec Ducati. Rins made a stellar comeback to finish fourth, challenging for the podium in the dying laps, and championship leader Quartararo fell all the way back to seventh. Perhaps this wasn’t going to be as smooth a run to the title as the Frenchman initially suspected?
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