until Abu Dhabi Autonomous Racing League
Much is being made of this weekend’s 2022 MotoGP championship decider in Valencia, with series bosses Dorna going all in on Thursday’s media day to hype up the fight between points leader Pecco Bagnaia and reigning champion Fabio Quartararo as much as possible – but with an almost-insurmountable mission ahead of the Frenchman, it’s, unfortunately, going to be very difficult for Sunday’s race to live up to the hype.
The MotoGP paddock has only been in Valencia one day, and we’ve already seen all sorts of PR activities loaded upon the two theoretical candidates, ranging from a one-on-one press conference (complete with a rider-sized #DECIDER spelled out in front of them) and a leathered-up photoshoot in pitlane at the Ricardo Tormo circuit complete with the championship trophy (which the superstitious Bagnaia refused to even touch).
And of course, you absolutely cannot blame Dorna for laying it on thick, especially given that we’re in an era where (if viewing figures and crowd attendance is to be believed), interest in the sport is waning. It’s Dorna’s job to sell this weekend’s action, and, while that’s not always something it succeeds in, this time Dorna is doing as good a job as possible to do so.
But the problem is deeper than the marketing campaign around the race, for more reasons than one. First and foremost, of course, is the huge odds that Quartararo is up against. Needing nothing short of a race victory to win the title, even that will require Bagnaia to finish outside the top 10 – meaning that regardless of what the Frenchman does, his fate remains in the hands of others.
Adding insult to injury, if you’re to look at recent form (and by recent, I mean the past three months) and had to pick one to win and one to struggle to score points, you’d have to put down the Monster Energy Yamaha rider and Lenovo Ducati racer the other way round, with Quartararo’s recent form slump going to require a remarkable turnaround in a very short period of time if he’s to have even the faintest chance of success.
With that in mind, a veteran colleague in the media centre put it to me succinctly on Thursday night when he pointed out that the most exciting part of the Valencia season finale weekend for him will be Tuesday, when riders jump onto their new 2023 machines for the first time.
No amount of boxing title fight weigh-in style antics three days before the season culminates is going to turn around that feeling, either. It’s an unenviable task to try and sell a fight that in reality doesn’t exist, but that’s the job that MotoGP has ahead of itself this weekend.
And the irony, of course, is that if we really do end up in a wild situation where Quartararo somehow does find himself in with a chance of retaining his title, it’s going to come in the final few laps of Sunday’s race – and realistically only after a mistake for Bagnaia or someone around him.
Should that happen, it’s going to have all the aspects that make sport a truly glorious thing: emotion, drama, and an unexpected underdog success. But while it might be something that will be remembered as a once-in-a-lifetime turnaround, how many people will be left tuning in to watch it given how preordained Bagnaia already seems to be?
