If Pecco Bagnaia does go on to lose the 2024 MotoGP title fight, it will be underperformance in the half-distance sprint races that will be responsible for his defeat.
A crash out of second place in the Sepang sprint means title rival Jorge Martin now has 29 points in hand over Bagnaia - giving the Pramac rider a first chance to clinch the title on Sunday, but also a clear pathway to seeing it over the line in the remaining races without having to beat Bagnaia at any point.
"I think Pecco will risk a lot to win [tomorrow], and to beat him in these conditions is really tough. He has nothing to lose now, it’s all or nothing, and we will try our best," said Martin.
"I think we [Bagnaia and I] are a step in front of the others, so in the worst case I will try to finish second and then we will see in the future."
So while Bagnaia does go into Sunday a likely favourite for Malaysian Grand Prix victory, his situation in the championship contest is desperate - and MotoGP's sprint format has clearly contributed enormously to this.
The Sepang error
Bagnaia's exit from the Sepang sprint on the third lap marked his fifth sprint race non-score of the season.
And it had been set up by Martin negating Bagnaia's qualifying triumph at the start, forcing his rival to chase him in the knowledge that Bagnaia only had a limited number of laps to recover the position.
Already on the first lap, Bagnaia had a big shake getting on the power coming out of Turn 9 - and he says this meant he was actually more conservative through the corner, which team-mate Enea Bastianini described as "very critical", in the following laps.
On lap three, Bagnaia caught "the bump in the apex of the corner" and lost the front just as he was coming out of the turn.
"I think it's not new," he said of the bump. "But I did I don't know how many laps this weekend or in the past, and I touched it many-many-many times and never crashed.
"There is always a first time, and it was not the right moment but it was something that, honestly, can happen."
THE BIGGEST MISTAKE POSSIBLE! ❌@PeccoBagnaia's title defence takes a huge blow after crashing out from P2 in the #TissotSprint 😱#MalaysianGP 🇲🇾 pic.twitter.com/s552pcs7Xz
— MotoGP™🏁 (@MotoGP) November 2, 2024
"When you release [the brake at Turn 9] sometimes you lose the front," sympathised Bastianini. "I lost the front in that corner two times but I stayed much luckier compared to Pecco."
Turn 9 had already caught out Aleix Espargaro twice in Friday practice, albeit both times the Aprilia rider crashed on corner entry rather than mid-corner like Bagnaia.
Bagnaia felt at that point in the sprint that he'd still have a good chance of getting back ahead of Martin.
"I was knowing that he was more in trouble with used tyres, and I was just waiting. As soon that I saw that he started better, I waited, and then I saw that the pace wasn't that fast. I just said 'okay, I will overtake, I will have a chance in the next laps'. And I tried in the first lap, I arrived in that Turn 9 a bit too aggressive and I started to have a lot of movement from the front, and I didn't crash.
"And the lap after I said 'okay, I will enter with more calm'. And I crashed. It's something that can happen.
"But I was quite sure that all the risk I was taking to fight back with Jorge wasn't over the limit. I was quite confident. But I crashed all the same."
How sprints are punishing Bagnaia
Bagnaia subsequently suggested that "all the mistakes I've done, all the lost points, are on the Saturdays".
This isn't strictly accurate as even if he doesn't count the two costly collisions with the Marquez brothers as mistakes on his part, he let 16 points go with a Sunday crash at Misano.
But what is true is that Bagnaia has outscored Martin by 19 points so far on Sundays - which offer twice the points of Saturdays - yet has picked up a staggering 48 points fewer in the sprints. That is the equivalent of four unanswered sprint wins.
Bagnaia's missing sprint podiums
Lusail - 4th, tyre vibration
Portimao - 4th, went off from the lead after miscalculating impact of low fuel
COTA - 8th, complained of lacking rear grip
Jerez - DNF, sandwiched between Binder and Bezzecchi
Le Mans - DNF, mechanical issue
Barcelona - DNF, crashed from the lead on the final lap
Silverstone - DNF, crashed from fourth after a ride height device-related bad start
Aragon - 9th, hinted at subpar front tyre
Phillip Island - 4th, struggled with bike in the wind
Sepang - DNF, crashed from second
"Jorge was just better on Saturdays this season, and we have to say that he did a very good job there," Bagnaia conceded.
"To improve on Saturdays [next year] will be already [enough] just to not crash. I lost, after six races at the start of the season, I was with 14 points on Saturdays and Jorge like 65-75.
"We've just had more crashes on Saturdays, I've had more problems on Saturdays. This is something we have to improve."
DNFs have been a part of that, but Bagnaia appearing uniquely exposed by the Saturday races relative to Martin - even if he has won five of them - has been a wider trend in 2024.
Their relative strengths are unquestionably a part of that. Martin and Bagnaia are closely matched over one lap, but Martin has consistently appeared more potent in the early stages of races - while Bagnaia's methodical approach to racing in MotoGP right now has been paying off instead in the longer-distance grands prix.
The Saturday-Sunday contrast has been exacerbated by the fact Bagnaia always improves a lot in-weekend, and his side of the Ducati works garage seems to consistently make the most of a Saturday 'rehearsal' ride to maximise the Sunday package.
But it's also become clear as of late that Martin has had his number when it comes to launching off the grid. And it means that Bagnaia has over and over again, even after qualifying well, put himself in a position to have to overtake Martin - something that is by definition easier to do on Sunday, where there is more pace management and more tyre drop-off, than in a relatively flat-out sprint.
"Honestly, long races, I feel that I can fight. I feel that I can be aggressive," said Bagnaia. "If you look at my first laps in all the long races, I'm always gaining positions, I'm always attacking. And in all the sprint races I never had the possibility, the chance, the feeling, to attack back.
"I'm never closer than three-four tenths, I'm always remaining there, and I don't have the power, the force, to fight back. And this is something that we have to understand."
The crashes have cost Bagnaia. But it's been a perfect storm of small problems - the weaker starts, the reliance on in-weekend progress and perhaps a sometimes-insufficient playing of the percentages - that has turned sprint wins into sprint defeats and turned regular sprint defeats into disastrous sprint non-scores.
