Two rounds into the 2018 MotoGP season, and our intrepid globe-trotting MotoGP correspondent Tug McClutchin has seen all he needs to see to call the championship winner…
So. Argentina huh? That was fun. Well, unless you’re Valentino Rossi. Or Marc Marquez. Or Espargaro. Or Pedrosa. Or Lorenzo. For them it sucked. And I don’t just mean sucked as in, “oh, that was an unfortunate turn of events, lets regroup and try harder next round”. I mean sucked as in the “What the hell did we waste all that time and money testing over summer for?” kind of sucked. It was epic. And in some cases, painful. But that’s racing. Unless you’re Rossi, in which case the racing sometimes comes second to brand building, but more on that later.
What we did learn though, is who the champion this year will be. How do we know? I’ll tell you. And sure, you can come sledge me on social media at the end of the year if I’m wrong. But you won’t, because I’ll be right. So you can come and praise me for being the Yoda of racing. But you won’t do that either, because me being right will piss you off so bad you’ll pretend you never read this piece. In fact you’ll probably pretend you never heard of me at all. And I won’t care. Because I will have already spent the money I get for writing this piece. In fact, I’ll have probably forgotten I wrote it myself. Booze will do that to a man.
So, lets split the players into 3 groups. Who can’t win, who can win, and who will win.
WHO CAN’T WIN.
This is the bunch who are racing not to win this year, but for some other reason. And they all know it. It might be the cash. Could be the promo girls. Or it could be that racing for a year and risking my life on this bloody shitbox just might lead to a better ride next year if I come 12th on a bike that should come 13th. Truth is it rarely does. Contract negotiations are far more nuanced than that. But for one reason or another, these guys are not contenders.
First cab off the rank… Rossi. Yeah, I went there. Might as well piss off 60% of the readership early, eh? Besides, I know you lot love being angry. How do I know he can’t win? Let me count the ways. I know you’re all hanging on grimly, determined his wearying bones will deliver that magical 10th championship, so you can tell everyone you told them so and validate the thousands of dollars you have spent on yellow 46 t-shirts, replica helmets and sun/moon cartoon bed linen. But you’ve been waiting 9 years already. At some point you’ll figure out it’s not coming. He’s not the best anymore.
Do we need to do this again? Oh, ok.
Sure, he’s still great. He’s brilliant. Hell, I’m a fan too. Love the guy. If he was a little less manly I’d boof him. But he’s not the best. Not any more. Hasn’t been since Stoner started tearing him a new one in 2008. He hasn’t won a title for 9 years. And since the last time he did, he’s only won 12 races. In the same period Dani Pedrosa has won 23 races, and none of you think he’s gonna win the title, do you? So wake up to yourselves. That said, I love when the faithful put their money where their mouth is and actually bet on him, because it makes the odds on the real contenders better, so keep it coming. My beach house in the Seychelles isn’t gonna pay for itself, you know.
Immediately after the race in Argentina, Rossi was in brand building mode. He knows the season is gone, because he couldn’t afford to miss out on points anywhere if he had a hope of winning it, because he’s just not going to win enough races. So he needed a solid points haul every round to be a chance. He’s already more than 20 points behind the leader. He’s done, and he knows it, so the aftermath of that race was all about building support and outrage in the yellow army, because nobody buys more merchandise than a pissed off Rossi fan. He knows he is still the top gun when it comes to brands in racing, and there’s only one way to stay there. It has nothing to do with winning, and everything to do with marketing the hell out of that shit. Creating a manufactured crowd hatred for Marquez hurts the Spaniard, not in terms of race results, but in terms of his earning power and his influence, and both of those are important to Rossi. He doesn’t just want to win on the track, he wants to win in the marketing stakes and in the power stakes, and hey, 2 out of 3 aint bad. He’ll take what he can get, because he’s determined to win. At something.
Since we already mentioned him, we might as well cover off Dani. The “Little Samurai” as the Japanese call him. He’s done for the year, thanks to Zarco smashing into him last week and breaking his wrist. But nobody cared about that. You were all too worried about Rossi and Marquez bumping into each other and then carrying on as angry Europeans do, like that was somehow shocking.
Marquez and Dani about to test new parts
On his day, when conditions suit, Dani Pedrosa is the best rider on the grid. Many of his competitors have said as much, including team mates. But his diminutive stature makes life hard for him on track. He can sometimes struggle to generate heat in the tyres due to having less mass to flex the tyre carcass, and there are other occasions when his physical size complicates things. But when he’s fast, he’s the best out there. Trouble is, those days just don’t come often enough. Dani’s reliably going to deliver 2 or 3 wins a year on average, but to win a title he needs to spend the rest of his time finishing in the top 5 or 6. Too often he’s down in 10th. He’s already 29 points behind, and even if he does race in Austin with the broken wrist, we can’t expect too much, especially given some of the hard braking zones there. Either way, he’ll struggle for the next 6 weeks or more, so that’s his season done. Thanks Zarco, ya massive dick. I’m sure the Catalan crowd at Barcelona in June will remind the frenchman how much they appreciate his efforts.
While we’re talking big names that can’t win, lets look at the ugliest Ducati investment since the original Multistrada, Jorge Lorenzo. He’s like a YouTube video, one where they show a seemingly endless stream of clips of people falling down stairs, dropping stuff on their toes and falling off ladders. They make you cringe, but you just can’t look away. Instead, you point and laugh. That’s George. In fact, it’s getting almost as funny as one of those videos too.
He’s not the first guy to be made look stupid by the Ducati. Rossi famously struggled to ride the thing, and it turned him into something resembling a terrified, self-questioning rookie. But that was a very different machine. In those days there was only one man in the world that could win races on it, and he was a freak that could have won on a Honda Cub. The Ducati of 2018 (and 2017 and 16 for that matter) is an eminently rideable motorcycle. Andrea, Jack, Danilo and Alvaro can ride it. Even Tito looks good on it, so it must be ok. Hell, it almost won the title last year. We can only assume George has suffered some kind of mental breakdown and has literally forgotten how to win motorcycle races. There is talk he wants to go to Suzuki. He’ll fit right in there. Neither of them expect to win.
Speaking of Suzuki, Rins and Iannone can’t win either. The Suzuki isn’t quite up to it, and neither are they.
Petrucci is too hot and cold, and will struggle to beat his teammate this year. He’ll end up at Aprillia at some stage.
There’s also a bunch of others I won’t bother listing. Suffice to say if you don’t see their names under the next two headings, you can count them as entrants in this one.
WHO CAN WIN
Let’s start with the current championship leader. Crutchlow. The 2018 Honda seems to have all the agility of the previous bike, and it’s sensational ability to carry heavy braking loads right to the apex. But Honda have also found a solution to their acceleration problems, which left them at the mercy of the Ducatis in a straight line drag race the last couple of years. With the acceleration issues resolved, the Honda is now a legitimate championship threat in the hands of any top rider, whereas previously only Marquez could manage to make up for its inability to get off corners quickly by getting into them faster than anyone else.
So now Cal is in with a chance. He’s leading the way now, and this may be the best shot he ever gets. He’s on a bike so close to the Repsol machines that it makes no real difference, and he has the pace in most conditions to have a crack. It’s likely he may cost himself a title with a couple of DNFs, but that’s Cal. He’d sure be a popular winner though if he pulled it off.
Zarco is always as fast, if not faster, than the two factory Yamaha guys. In fact he is likely to beat both of them in the title. He should win some races too. Will it be enough to win a title? That’s unlikely, but his consistency will see him there or thereabouts at year end.
This is what the Catalan Crowd will to to Zarco if they get old of him
As for Yamaha factory rider Maverick Vinales, he needs to start showing the speed that his first name deserves. You can’t be called Maverick and not ride like a top gun. That’s just a travesty. I still remember his first test on the Yamaha, bedecked in the black and red fighter pilot livery and leathers that his new team had prepared to make him welcome. He rode the arse off that thing first time out, and after the first test fans and journos everywhere were proclaiming him the new chosen one and suggesting he would win the title in his rookie year. Can he win this year? Sure. Will he? Probably not, but he’s well placed and consistent, so anything is possible.
Jack Miller is the joker in this pack. I admit a Miller title win is highly unlikely, but he has the speed, he has the bike, and he has no fear. That makes him a chance, albeit a very slight one. It also makes him dangerous. A couple of DNFs will finish his chances, but it will be fun to watch, and if that loose unit is within reach of the title in the last few rounds, it will be compulsory viewing.
Marquez is always at the pointy end. He’s the best. He’s the fastest. He’s the hungriest. He’s desperate to win every time he takes to the track. And that can be his downfall. Many riders have won titles by being the very model of consistency, winning occasionally and finishing on the podium more often than not. That’s all it takes. Nicky Hayden won his title with 2 wins and 10 podiums. But Marquez wants to win the title by winning every race along the way. That’s what makes him different to everyone else. Settling for second burns him to the core. Even when he let Jack Miller score his maiden MotoGP win and didn’t put up a fight because Jack was no threat in the title, you could see it hurt.
Make no mistake, he will go down in history as the greatest of all time by the time he’s done. He will win more championships than anyone. He’s 25 and already has 6 of them. That’s nuts. He could have 10 by the time he’s 30. If he rides until he’s 35 he could have 13 or 14. Or more. Who the hell knows? As for this year, he’s started off on the wrong foot. He’s 18 points behind Cal, and 15 behind Andrea. He’ll likely make some of that up next weekend at Austin, as the last 11 times he’s ridden a GP in America he’s won it. It’s true. He’s won the last 9 races at either Austin or Indy in MotoGP, and the previous 2 in Moto2, and after last weekend he will be out to stamp his authority on the field. Barring a crash, he will win in Austin. He will brutalize them. Then it’s game on for the rest of the season.
But will he be consistent enough? Will he push too hard a couple of times in the face of the extra competition this year and rob himself of the title?
WHO WILL WIN
Strike a pose Andrea. It’s all there for you
Andrea Dovizioso. He was the bridesmaid last year, hindered by an idiot teammate with an inability to comprehend the most simple instructions, and a points gap he couldn’t quite overcome at the end. A couple of poor results where he could have done better hurt him, and Marquez rode like a champ when it mattered. But Dovi will have learnt from that. It was the first time he was truly a contender. That has an effect on a man. Having a taste of something you never really thought you’d get to drink just makes you want more. Kind of like The Macallan 18 I’ve been drinking while writing this drivel. Poor people don’t drink The Macallan 18, so once you’ve had it, you work harder to find someone to publish more of your crap so you can afford it again. Dovi doesn’t want to drink Johnny Red anymore. He wants The Macallan. Dovi knows he can win a few races and be consistently top 3 or 4 in the rest of them. That, he can do. He rarely crashes of his own accord. Almost never, actually. And the factory team will throw their full efforts behind him because Lorenzo is headed for a lunatic asylum by the mid-season break. If Marquez misses points in a couple more races, which is eminently possible, then Dovizioso screams into favoritism. I’m tipping this is his year.
Besides, the odds on Marquez are too tight to bother punting, and MotoGP is all about money. And good scotch.