Will Marco Bezzecchi win the Australian MotoGP despite receiving two long-lap penalties?
He certainly has speed, as evidenced by his windy warm-up.
The sprint winner’s advantage peaked when he was more than a second off the field as riders swapped to medium rear tires (and in most cases hard front tires).
Bezzecchi had to take a penalty for a scary incident on the opening lap with Marc Marquez at Mandalica, and practiced some loops in the warm-up.
The penalty is expected to cost Bezzecchi a total of five to six seconds, as well as his place on the track. However, in the half-distance sprint, he won by more than three seconds, despite passing Raul Fernandez.
Home hero Jack Miller, who had qualified on the front row but unfortunately lost out to Pedro Acosta in third place in the sprint, reversed the standings by pulling away from the KTM rider in second place (+0.394 seconds from Bezzecchi) in the warm-up.
Pole qualifier Fabio Quartararo lost his chance of a sprint after opting for a medium front tyre, but will be looking to make up for this morning’s hard front in fourth place.
Fernandes, Pol Espargaro, Ai Ogura, Alex Marquez, Luca Marini and Fabio Di Giannantonio completed the warm-up top ten.
Riders took to the track for this morning’s 10-minute session to find gusts of 50 to 60 km/h and cloudy skies that pushed them down the home straight, but turned into crosswinds at turns like Stoner Corner.
Fortunately, no one fell during the warm-up, so MotoGP is hoping the winds will calm down and the risk of rain will be gone ahead of the delayed race at 3pm.
Some riders, such as Quartararo, have suggested they are betting on continuing to use soft rear tires in Grands Prix, but Marini believes that will end in disaster.
“We choose our media, and I think it would be the same choice for everyone,” Marini said.
“If someone wants to try softs, they’ll probably do what Jorge Martin did in the past. Great, then the tires will be done in the last four laps!”
Bagnaia finishes last after heavy shaking in GP25
Francesco Bagnaia had a miserable weekend, finishing last in the warm-up.
Any notion that the Ducati Lenovo rider’s problems were purely mental was undermined when his GP25 shook violently as he exited the high-speed final corner early in the session.
The two-time world champion switched to a second bike, which worked well in the sessions so far, but still returned to the pits 13 seconds off the pace and finished his warm-up early.
“Both bikes had some issues, we just have to iron them out for the race,” a gloomy Bagnaia said after the match.
Any chance of breaking into the top 10 this afternoon?
“I don’t think so, but let’s see,” Bagnaia replied.
Bagnaia and Brad Binder will receive a three-place grid penalty for this race, dropping them to 14th and 16th on the grid respectively.