As if it were the evening before the most anticipated boxing match of the year, the organization of the MotoGP World Championship placed the two candidates for the title face to face at the press conference prior to the Qatar GP. This weekend, Jorge Martín and Pecco Bagnaia star in the penultimate assault on the championship, with the Madrid native chasing the current world champion in the standings. Only 14 points separate them with 74 at stake, and it is the Spaniard who recognizes that the time has come to go on the attack under the lights that illuminate the night races scheduled in Lusail.
“Now I am going to take all the risks to be first. Maybe I'm going to risk it to get it,” warns the 25-year-old pilot from San Sebastián de los Reyes. Next to him, the number one of the competition, also a pillar of the Ducati project, listens attentively with a half smile and his usual reflective pose. “I don't consider this weekend as a match point,” says the 26-year-old from Turin. “I need to get 23 points from him and I consider that they are too many seeing how well Jorge is working in this final stretch,” he adds, making it clear that he has well studied the numbers of this tight finale. “I don't know the math, but I do know that I need to recover points,” says Martín.
Despite their cordial relationship, the underlying tension is evident in Martín's nervous gestures with his hands and his head bowed while both listen to the battery of questions focused solely and exclusively on this explosive resolution of the contest between two pilots wearing exactly the same machinery. The last time they faced each other in Qatar, they remind you, in March 2022, Bagnaia took Martín's place while they fought for eighth position in a race that Gresini won with Enea Bastianini, now the Italian's teammate and possible guest of stone in the resolution of the contest after its revival in Malaysia last week.
“We are going to take the title to Valencia,” promises Martín. “I feel like there is a lot of pressure, we all know that. It is a complicated, important weekend, because I know that I cannot make any mistakes,” acknowledges the Pramac candidate. The Madrid native needs to get at least 15 points this weekend to maintain his mathematical chances, although he aims for a double to continue depending on himself and not on the results of his great rival. With four victories in the remaining races, the Spaniard would take the title by two points, although Bagnaia would always be second behind.
Winning this Saturday is the easiest way to prevent the Turin native from having a chance of revalidating his crown this Sunday in Qatar. “There is a small possibility, but it is difficult for it to happen. For it to happen, Jorge would have to have a problem. With the level we are at, it is impossible for it to happen without a mistake,” emphasizes the champion. Bagnaia seems to put all the attack responsibility on Martín. Former teammates in 2015 in the ranks of Aspar in Moto3, both recognize that they respect each other, but they are not friends, a fact that facilitates their duels on the asphalt.
In Malaysia, both contenders already engaged in a fight to the limit in the opening stages of Sunday's race, with Bagnaia taking the assault in Sepang with a podium that tasted like victory after a brutal overtaking on the outside in the fastest corner on the track. A post-race penalty, however, took away an important wild card he had hoped to play with. Both candidates have already been warned for having ridden more than 50% of a long race below the minimum pressure established by the World Cup tire supplier. This new regulation means that a new non-compliance would lead to an automatic three-second penalty and a more than likely change in the result and the final classification of the World Cup. “I hope the title is not decided in an office,” Martín wishes. Both he and Bagnaia have been critical in the past of this new regulation which, yes, now threatens both of them equally.
Martín y Bagnaia se retan por el Mundial bajo las luces de Qatar | Motociclismo | Deportes | EL PAÍS (elpais.com)