Francesco Bagnaia’s Misano MotoGP win was not that different from the three that immediately preceded it, but it carried with it a certain points significance – one that’s unlikely to play an active role in the outcome of the 2022 season yet is symbolic nonetheless.
Closing to within 30 points of leader Fabio Quartararo with six grands prix to go means that Bagnaia’s championship hopes are now – semantically, anyway – completely in his hands. If he wins every race from now, he’s champion whatever Quartararo does.
Six more wins would of course take Bagnaia to 10 in a row, a feat only accomplished by two riders in the last half-century in Mick Doohan and Marc Marquez. In other words, it isn’t terribly likely. But it’s not like Quartararo is finishing second to Bagnaia every weekend.
The Yamaha man is particularly susceptible to the Ducati armada right now. He mostly overcame it, against the odds, at the Red Bull Ring – but not at Silverstone and Misano. And his Aragon chances do not look amazing, not just because of the 968-metre back straight that his Yamaha will be punished on but just based off past record.
He did win there in his second CEV Moto3 season in 2014, but in the grand prix paddock it just hasn’t worked out, including in the premier class. A decent fifth in 2019, but then anonymous in the 2020 double-header (admittedly one pole, but it was turned into a woeful 18th-place finish) and fairly quiet last year.
At the same time, the Ducatis are good, and have long been good, at Aragon, where Bagnaia already won last year. So there’s reason to expect another points swing.
“It’s going to be the toughest race of the [six] last ones, I think,” Quartararo told MotoGP.com of Aragon.
“I want to make a great race there – I’ve never made better than a top-five, hopefully we can be really strong and try to push ourselves to make a great race and be proud.”
Yamaha takes some comfort from Quartararo’s unlikely, and somewhat heroic, podium in Austria.
“Traditionally, Aragon is not an easy track for us, but neither is the Spielberg circuit, and Fabio’s pace was still competitive enough there for second place,” said team director Massimo Meregalli.
But still, Quartararo and Yamaha will be keenly aware they may need outside help this weekend to minimise the damage to Bagnaia or put him under pressure.
That much is clear from Quartararo’s jovial assessment of Marquez’s impending return: “I hope he can be fighting with us pretty soon, to destroy a little bit the plan of the red bikes.”
The six-time MotoGP champion is coming back to premier class competition this weekend after an absence of nearly four months. He is dynamite at Aragon – it is not quite a Sachsenring or Austin-level circuit for him where he’s basically unbeatable, but it might just be in the tier right below those with Termas de Rio Hondo.
Yet the idea of Marquez going for the win immediately at Aragon seems far-fetched. Even assuming that he can extract the kind of pace from the 2022 Honda as he did back at Austin – and that is a big assumption, as the RC213V appears to have grown considerably less competitive – he would’ve been a much bigger threat for Aragon had he returned a race or two prior and already settled back in after his absence.
As he didn’t, there will be a natural cautiousness to proceedings this weekend – and therefore, if Quartararo struggles, Marquez is probably much more likely to take points off Quartararo than off Quartararo and Bagnaia.
There is, however, another Aragon specialist who should be better prepared to take on Bagnaia and the Ducatis.
Aleix Espargaro has long excelled at the Spanish venue, where he has nine top-10 finishes in 13 attempts – a record that is put in a better light when you remember the various peaks and troughs of his career.
He was fourth last time out at Aragon – while back in 2014 he picked up his first-ever MotoGP podium there despite being sent into the run-off and down to 19th place by a Bradley Smith opening-lap lunge.
A perfectly-timed decision to swap from slicks to wets with six laps left to run was what ultimately made a remarkable second place for the Forward team possible – but even before that he had made his way up to sixth place.
“I’m super happy to finish Austria and Misano,” Espargaro said after the Misano race.
“Two sixth places, in the past when I finished sixth we did a party in Aprilia. Very difficult circuits for me. Very difficult circuits.
“I made a big, big, big effort, super focused, working and giving my best and I finished sixth in both races.
“Now it’s downhill [in a good way] – we go in very good circuits where I have really, really good feelings with this bike, in the past also. I can’t wait.”
Espargaro is just three points behind Bagnaia in the title race, so he’s far from an ideal ‘spoiler’ for Quartararo – because he’s also an obvious title threat. But he might still be the best ‘spoiler’ out there.
Maverick Vinales isn’t exactly an Aragon virtuoso. Quartararo’s Yamaha team-mate Franco Morbidelli, though an Aragon race winner back in 2020, is simply not in the picture this year. And Bagnaia’s Ducati stablemates will have heard CEO Claudio Domenicali’s rather pointed remarks about how hard Enea Bastianini raced Bagnaia last time out.
So if Quartararo is to keep dropping points to his rivals – which seems inevitable at least at Aragon given what we’ve seen from the 2022 Yamaha – it would be for the best mathematically for Quartararo to have his rivals take turns outscoring him rather than just have Bagnaia maintain his phenomenal momentum.
A standout Espargaro performance at Aragon can properly rejuvenate his own title charge. Yet it can also help his points-leading friend.
