Jorge Martin was distracted. And with good reason.
A crash from the lead in Indonesia last season played a crucial role in him losing the 2023 world championship to Francesco Bagnaia, while another spill – again from the lead – in Saturday’s sprint race at Mandalika handed Bagnaia victory on a platter.
The doubts in the back of his mind grew, the pressure of history repeating weighing down both shoulders.
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The Spaniard’s response? An emphatic win from pole position to extend his MotoGP world championship lead on Sunday in Lombok, and one that temporarily put the voices in his head on mute.
Revenge, as it turned out, was best served steaming hot. On a track nudging 60 degrees in the searing topical sun, Martin managed to beat his rivals and master his mind. The latter, it seemed, was the tougher of the two opponents.
“I got revenge from Mandalika,” Martin grinned after taking his first Grand Prix victory since France in May, and one that saw his championship lead over Bagnaia swell to 21 points with five rounds to go.
“After last season’s crash, today was a difficult race. After yesterday’s crash, also. After 13 laps, I had some ghosts on my mind on corner 11 [where he crashed in 2023]. Every lap on corner 16 [where he crashed in Saturday’s sprint], I was trying to be really careful.
“The mental side of things was really complicated.”
After taking pole position by demolishing the Mandalika circuit record with a lap of 1min 29.088secs on Saturday morning – nearest rival and fellow Ducati rider Marco Bezzecchi was over half a second slower – Martin’s confidence, rarely in short supply at any time, was sky-high.
Not even making it through one lap leading the sprint – he remounted after his off and finished a chastened 10th – stung. And, as he admitted after Sunday’s victory, provided a needed dose of humility.
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“This weekend I was maybe too confident,” he said.
“I felt really strong and everything came so good, I was too confident and then I did a mistake. I need to be a bit more alert.
“I tried to be calm always [on Sunday], I tried to be my best version. Even if the rider behind is one-tenth [of a second] or eight [tenths], it’s important to always do the same thing. I didn’t try to change or push more or less.”
After crossing the finish line for his third Grand Prix win of the year – and punching a hole in his bike’s windscreen in jubilation, as he did at Le Mans – Martin had some closure to attend to before the podium ceremony.
Riding – slowly – into the penultimate corner of the track where he’d crashed 24 hours earlier, the Spaniard climbed off his Ducati, knelt on the tarmac, and kissed the same spot where he’d slipped off a day before.
Ghosts, vanquished. Distractions, done and dusted.
ACOSTA GETS SECOND … EVENTUALLY
While Martin was never headed across 27 laps on Sunday, it was chaos behind him – and even for some of the riders who did finish the race, just 12 of the 21 starters seeing the chequered flag.
Rookie sensation Pedro Acosta has cooled off from his red-hot start to life in MotoGP, when the 20-year-old scored podium finishes in Portugal (third) and the Americas (second) inside his first three Grands Prix. But the GasGas rider was superb all weekend long in Lombok, a front-row start after qualifying third coming before he matched a career-best with second to Martin in Sunday’s race, finishing just 1.404secs adrift.
Acosta’s initial joy for his best result since Austin was tempered when it appeared that he would be hit with a 16-second post-race penalty for a tyre pressure breach. But two hours after the race finished, Acosta was cleared after race stewards deemed his loss of tyre pressure was down to a leaking wheel rim.
Acosta inherited third place in Aragon in early September after Bagnaia and Alex Marquez crashed while disputing the final podium place in the closing laps, but Sunday’s result was one earned on pace and merit, again showing why KTM was so keen to promote him in place of Australia’s Jack Miller at its factory team from next season.
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From third on the grid, Acosta scythed past the fast-starting Ducati of Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix winner Enea Bastianini on lap three and didn’t allow Martin to relax, never showing his compatriot a front wheel, but staying within a second of the lead until lap 21, when Bastianini crashed and left Acosta under little pressure from behind.
“The team and the factory deserve this result, they are working like hell to bring this bike to the top level and we are getting closer,” Acosta said.
“For sure [a win] was coming to my mind, but it was super close. But we need to be happy because today we were really strong.
“We know that our weakest point is the beginning of the races … for this I was trying to pass Bastianini and pull with Martin quite early, because this is what gives you life.”
Acosta’s result saw him rise to fifth in the world championship standings as the sole rookie in the field, passing KTM stablemate Brad Binder, who finished in eighth place after a nightmare qualifying left the South African in 19th on the grid.
Binder, and Honda rider Takaaki Nakagami (11th), were also investigated for front tyre pressure breaches after the race; while Binder was cleared, Nakagami was issued a 16-second penalty that dropped him to 12th, behind last-placed finisher Alex Rins (Yamaha).
BAGNAIA THANKFUL AFTER SLOW START
Bagnaia, who came from 13th on the grid to win last year’s Indonesian Grand Prix after Martin inexplicably crashed from a three-second lead, was left to count his good fortune even after Acosta’s retention of second cost him another four world championship points in his fight with Martin.
From fourth on the grid, the Italian made a poor start and was never in contention for victory, spending much of the race trapped behind Ducati trio Bastianini, Bezzecchi and Martin’s teammate Franco Morbidelli, advancing onto the podium after Bastianini crashed with five laps left and after he’d finally demoted his Italian compatriots on lap 23.
Bagnaia – who described this year’s title fight as “a championship of mistakes” after Martin’s sprint crash came after his own fall from third place a week earlier – was left to rue his getaway from the second row of the grid, but conceded more than third “was difficult” on a day where he eroded three points from Martin’s advantage after the previous round at Misano.
“The last two seasons I was always perfect in the start, but in the last four Grands Prix from Aragon I’m starting every time in a different way, and every time bad,” he said.
“Today … I wheelie and I was lucky I didn’t lose too much position. But I was a bit too careful in the first lap and I lost positions, so my mistake there. After five or six laps I was back in my pace and I was quite strong, but I missed the first five laps.”
PIT TALK PODCAST: In the Indonesian GP preview episode of ‘Pit Talk’, hosts Renita Vermeulen and Matt Clayton look ahead to MotoGP’s return to Mandalika, reflect on the crazy 2023 race that tipped the title scales in Francesco Bagnaia’s favour, and assess which of Aprilia or KTM could emerge to challenge the all-conquering Ducatis this weekend.
Bagnaia said the crash of his teammate Bastianini – who had just set the fastest lap of the race (1:30.539) on lap 20 before falling at the first corner on his next lap – showed why the pace advantage of this year’s Ducati GP24 – which has won 12 of the 15 Grands Prix – comes at a cost.
“I’m sorry for Enea because I think this is something this season that is happening very much – you are pushing and you feel very good, you are doing what you have done all the weekend and you crash without advice [warning],” he said.
“It happened many times to me, to Jorge and ‘Bestia’ [Bastianini]. I think it’s something related to our bike, it has a huge performance but we have to understand better this thing with the new tyres.
“It’s something that just doing it, you can learn. It’s a shame that it’s like this, but it’s the only way.”
MILLER PUTS HIS HAND UP AFTER FIRST-LAP MAYHEM
Jack Miller’s second pointless race weekend in succession was over quickly in Indonesia, the Australian taking the blame for a four-rider pile-up on the first lap that saw his 27-lap race over in 29 seconds.
The 29-year-old, who finished 11th from 16th on the grid in Saturday’s sprint, checked up when he was squeezed in the mid-pack soon after the start and fell on the inside of the third corner, skating across the track and taking out Honda’s Luca Marini, Aprilia’s Aleix Espargaro and Ducati’s Alex Marquez in the process, and forcing Honda’s Joan Mir to take avoiding action across the run-off area.
All four riders escaped without injury, and while the race stewards didn’t immediately penalise Miller for the incident, the Australian was quick to put his hand up – and check on the welfare of his peers – afterwards.
“I got away to a decent start, threaded the needle at Turn 1 into Turn 2 and went in there side-by-side with Aleix and tried to keep the speed on the inside for corner three,” he explained.
“[Aprilia’s Maverick Vinales] was holding a tight line with whoever was on his outside, and when I went into Turn 3, I saw how close I was [to Vinales] and as soon as I grabbed the front brake, she went down.
“I want to apologise to those guys because it wasn’t my intention. It was a racing incident, trying to negotiate a million different things at once and unfortunately this time I got caught out by it.
“I was in the wrong, I made the mistake. I was the first one to hit the ground, but I didn’t hit anybody. The reason I crashed was to not hit anybody. I don’t feel I did anything over the top, it was just one of those things.”
Miller, who has just three top-10 starting positions in 15 rounds, said it was on him to qualify higher up the grid to avoid being in the middle of the pack on the first lap.
“When you start in 16th, it’s chaos back there,” he said.
“In the first lap, it’s your only real opportunity – especially around here – to make some decent passes because once you get in a rhythm, it’s very difficult to make the difference.”
OLIVEIRA, DI GIANNANTONIO LEAD WALKING WOUNDED
With just 12 finishers on Sunday, the Indonesian Grand Prix was the most attritional of 2024; one rider may have ridden his last lap of the season even before Sunday’s race, with Trackhouse Aprilia’s Miguel Oliveira returning to Europe for surgery after breaking his right wrist in opening practice.
The 2022 Indonesian GP winner, set to partner Miller at the all-new Pramac Racing Yamaha team for 2025, was spat off his Aprilia at Turn 4 on Friday at Mandalika after an electronics glitch turned off his traction control as he wound on the throttle coming out of the corner, the resultant highside seeing him land on his wrist.
With the final five rounds of the season taking place in the next six weeks, Trackhouse are expected to draft in experienced Aprilia test rider Lorenzo Savadori, who has competed as a wildcard in four events this season for Aprilia’s factory team, as the Portuguese rider’s replacement for the balance of the season.
At Ducati, Fabio Di Giannantonio is contemplating end-of-season surgery after a left shoulder injury sustained in practice for August’s Austrian Grand Prix continues to hamper him, the Italian scoring just 18 points in four events after returning for Aragon.
Di Giannantonio has been one of the season’s biggest improvers after scoring a maiden podium in last year’s Australian Grand Prix and winning the penultimate round of the season in Qatar, and is 10th in this year’s championship with 122 points after crashing out of seventh in Sunday’s race.
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