© Bruce Allen. Exclusive to Motorcycle.com
Maverick Viñales Starts his Own Era
Movistar Yamaha’s new kid on the block, Maverick Viñales, did to the field of the 2017 Grand Prix of Qatar what he’s done ever since he first placed his bum on the saddle of the YZR-M1 last November. He ended the day at the top of the timesheets, having outdueled factory Ducati #1 Andrea Dovizioso over the last eight laps of the race. In the process, he took the lead in the 2017 championship and initiated what is likely to become known as The Viñales Years.
Saturday Washout
Weather conditions on Saturday evening in metropolitan Doha area were so foul that FP4, Q1, and Q2 were all scrubbed, leaving the combined results from the three completed practices as a proxy for the starting grid, to the immense dismay of Valentino Rossi, Jorge Lorenzo, Alex Rins and, one expects, Cal Crutchlow. Scott Redding, having led QP3, was overheard wandering the paddock in the wee hours, sniffing about how he COULD have taken the pole and it’s just so unfair.
Whatever. Behind the front row, at least, the starting grid was a random collection of hardware and talent. An unexpected way to start the season. In an unfriendly locale, with Aliens Rossi and Lorenzo pedaling hard on the fourth row. And the impudent Johann Zarco comfortably seated in fourth.
Rain in the Desert
The weather was bad enough on Saturday to scrub everything in all classes, a veritable gullywasher of a day. And here I thought the ONLY good thing about racing here is that at least you don’t have to worry about rain. Sunday came along with much more teasing kinds of conditions–spitting rain, breezy, high humidity, scudding clouds. Just as the Moto2 tilt (won by Franco Morbidelli for his first Moto2 victory) was ending, it started sprinkling.
Dorna and FIM executives began hemming and hawing. Riders started calling their garages for tires, making changes on the track. The bikes left the track, the bikes re-entered the track. The race was shortened from 22 to 21 laps, then to 20 with two warm-up laps, by which time the rain had mostly stopped. Several riders watched the red lights go out with tires they had never, or barely, ridden, traction and wear issues all over the place. Madness was in the air.
A Rookie Leads at the Start
Andrea Iannone won the hole shot, but as the field headed towards Turns 2 and 3 one of the Tech 3 Yamahas materialized at the front, accompanied by the animated shouting of announcer Nick Harris, “Johann Zarco leads the Grand Prix of Qatar!” Madness! Zarco was followed in close order by Marc Marquez, Iannone, Andrea Dovizioso on the Ducati, and Viñales, who was keeping his powder dry within shouting distance of the front.
By Lap 6, Zarco was looking very relaxed, trailed by Dovizioso, Marquez, Iannone, Viñales and, of all people, Valentino Rossi, who had started 10th but worked himself up close to the lead group. The law of averages suddenly made its presence felt, as Zarco crashed out of the lead on Lap 7. Then there were five. Having picked my boy Cal Crutchlow to finish on the podium today, he took revenge on me for past insults, real and imagined, by crashing out on Lap 4. Crashlow got back up and immediately crashed again on his Lap 5 for good measure.
Viñales Prevails
With Dovizioso leading by mid-race, Iannone and Marquez traded a little paint here and there, just like the old days, while the two factory Yamahas lurked in fourth and fifth places. Almost on cue, on Lap 10 Iannone had an unforced lowside in Turn 7 and crashed out of podium contention.
The last eight laps were outstanding. While Marquez faded to fourth, never appearing totally comfortable with his tires, Dovi and Viñales began enjoying a number of close encounters, Rossi hanging back, appearing to wait for something to happen in front of him. Viñales would take the lead around Turn 6 and keep it through Turn 16, after which Dovizioso would blow by him on the main straight and take the lead heading into Turn 1. This continued until the two riders entered Turn 1 on the last lap with Viñales in the lead. He held it all the way, in and through Turn 16, and took the win by half a second. A legend, as the expression goes, is born.
Elsewhere on the Grid
Dani Pedrosa has had worse days than today. With little expected from him, he qualified seventh, spent the early part of the race in mid-pack, then bided his time as guys started falling off in front of him, ultimately finishing fifth. Shades of Colin Edwards late in his career. Aleix Espargaro, in perhaps the best ride of the day, flogged his factory Aprilia from 15th position at the start to sixth at the finish, the best result for the team since they re-entered MotoGP last year. Scott Redding scored a heartening seventh on his Ducati GP16, Jack Miller (we are officially amazed) was eighth on the Marc VDS Honda, and my boy Alex Rins held onto his Suzuki well enough all day for ninth place, becoming the leading rookie for the season.
For other riders, the 2017 opener was forgettable. Crashers include Crutchlow (2), Iannone, Zarco and Bautista, while Danilo Petucci had to retire his GP17 with mechanical issues. The KTM team of Pol Espargaro and Bradley Smith was saved from the indignity of finishing last and next-to-last only by the futility of Sam Lowes, who delivered his own Aprilia to the finish line some 40 seconds behind teammate Aleix, and was the last rider to cross the line. Out of the points and, hopefully, dissuaded from any illusion that he might score more than 20 points all year.
We would be derelict in our reportorial duties were we to fail to mention that triple world champion Jorge Lorenzo, in his debut with his new Italian employer, started 12th, had four guys in front of him crash out or retire, and finished 11th, 20 seconds behind teammate Dovizioso. We know rain gives Jorge the yips. Now, it appears that high humidity does the same thing. And, lest readers assume this is just a Qatarian anomaly, it is true that Lorenzo won here last year from pole. Just sayin’.
The Big Picture
Having been burned in the past, we must be careful to draw too many conclusions from what occurred tonight. We learned, or confirmed our suspicions about, several things:
- Maverick Viñales is a baller.
- Valentino Rossi at age 38 is about as good as anyone out there.
- The Suzuki can compete for wins.
- Andrea Dovizioso is the #1 rider on the factory Ducati team.
- We have been underestimating Johann Zarco since November.
In two weeks the grid heads off to Argentina for its annual Bungle in the Jungle. Rio Hondo is a Honda-friendly circuit, as is Austin two weeks later. Marc Marquez should win the next two races. If, instead, Maverick Viñales should win either, MotoGP is likely to have a new champion this year. And if it does, you can tell your grandkids you watched Maverick win the very first race of The Viñales Years.
Qualifying had produced an ethnically-striated grid—Spaniards filling up rows one and three, with an all-Italian second row and an all-British fourth. Lorenzo laid down a fast lap early in the session, as did Marquez a bit later, and both held up despite Maverick Vinales and “Maniac Joe” Iannone taking serious runs at them at session’s end. Vinales missed out on the two hole by 4/1000ths of a second. Iannone could have easily moved up to the front row had he not been momentarily held up by Scott Redding, who appeared to be doing his best to get out of the way. (A track record final lap by Marquez was tossed when it was determined he had started it one second after the checkered flag had waved.)
team, trailed by Valentino Rossi and Marquez. At the start of Lap 2, both Ducatis flew past Lorenzo, Iannone in the lead. Marquez slipped past Rossi on Lap 3 and began dogging Lorenzo on Lap 4. I was just getting comfortable with the idea of Iannone winning his first premier class race when he lowsided out of the lead in Turn 13 of Lap 6, leaving Dovizioso to slug it out with the Aliens. Sure enough, on Lap 9 Lorenzo found his way through on Dovizioso and that was that. Marquez and Dovizioso would trade places a few times over the remaining 14 laps, but no one was able to mount any kind of serious challenge to Lorenzo once he found his rhythm.
Right, so Rossi and Lorenzo were reportedly offered contracts for 2017-18 simultaneously, by email. Rossi signs his immediately. Lorenzo does not. Rossi suggests Lorenzo is shopping Ducati. (Lorenzo is, in fact, shopping Ducati.) Lorenzo fires back that Rossi had no choice because no one else would want him. Boom. Bradley Smith, on the verge of eviction by Tech 3 boss Herve Poncharal, signs a deal with KTM for next year, leaving Yamaha a spot with which to woo Alex Rins.
2013–Heading into the season, with Stoner gone and Marquez arrived, defending world champion Jorge Lorenzo looked ready, willing and able to repeat, with chase coming from Pedrosa, Rossi and Marquez. Rossi would take most of the year to get comfortable on the Yamaha in his first year back from Ducati purgatory. Pedrosa and Lorenzo got hurt in the Netherlands and Germany. Marquez made it look easy, snatching his first world championship as a rookie and assaulting the record books across the board. Crutchlow, Bautista and Bradl were expected to make some noise at some point, and mostly didn’t.
of several races early, concedes the early lead to Lorenzo, concedes more to Rossi, and watches helplessly as the title devolves into a Rossi vs. Lorenzo scrap. He mixes it up with Rossi on several occasions, the Italian getting the better of all of them. Rossi and Lorenzo head into Valencia essentially tied for the lead but with Rossi having been severely punished for events in Sepang, resulting in him starting last on the grid and ultimately finishing fourth, with Lorenzo cruising to both the win and the championship, Marquez at his wing.
Several things. Lorenzo appears to be the man to beat. Maverick Vinales intends to stick his nose in some podium contests and appears to have sufficient machine beneath him to do so. Rossi, Marquez and Iannone appear destined to battle Vinales for second and third. Scott Redding may have found the right bike at the right time to propel him into a consistent top six performer. (Remember him during his last season in Moto2 when he would ride the wheels off in the turns then get eaten alive in the straights.) Dani Pedrosa needs to stay upright all season long if he wants to finish in the top four, otherwise he is destined for a second division seeding along with:
Stoner in 2011, Lorenzo in 2012 and Marquez in 2014. Since they are also three of the last five, it’s clear to me that past performance has little to do with future performance. Recent performance, however, might well have something to do with performance this year.
Vinales and young Alex Rins in Moto2 are in the wind, pretty much everyone’s best guess as to Aliens-in-Waiting. An aging Dani Pedrosa (dearly coveted by KTM for 2017) at Repsol Honda, a seriously aging Rossi at Yamaha; at some point the suits are gonna pull some plugs. Plus, it’s impossible not to wonder when Casey Stoner, watching riders he considers barely his equal go flying over the handlebars trying to get it on with the Michelins, says “lol” and climbs back onboard for a wildcard at Phillips Island. Could throw a spanner into the works of more than one rider at that point in the season. Easier to envision if doing so were to provide him an opportunity to interrupt a Yamaha or a Honda on its way to the title. Stoner could easily add some extra testosterone to the mix.
Factor in the cosmic motion brought on by new ECU and Michelins, and uncharacteristically good performances by names like Barbera and Redding–indeed, much of the Ducati contingent–and you could leave Qatar with three Ducs in the top five. Then move the entire show to the Middle of Nowhere, Argentina-style for the annual Bungle in the Jungle, aka Hot and Hondarific, two weeks later, followed immediately by another Honda clambake the ensuing week in Austin.
Vinales is an Alien waiting to happen, looking for that big contract next season, which might even come from Suzuki. Suzuki needs another two man team and more data; they’re onto something there and they need to wear long pants and do this thing right. They could win the whole thing in a year or two.
Andrea Iannone should have what it takes to be the top Ducati rider in 2016, meaning he should be a top three contender. So Iannone, Redding and Vinales challenge Lorenzo and Marquez each week and Rossi some weeks, with more of Pedrosa or Barbera late in the season.
I’ve just discovered something I, as a would be writer, loathe. Note to self: Never use this technique unless it pertains to, say, the last race of the season, 5 points separating teammates and rivals, Marquez in the mix, in which case it may be permissible to jock the sport while you’re reporting on it. Otherwise, DO NOT PROMOTE MOTOGP WHILE YOU’RE IN REPORTER MODE.
people I know and people in the universe to read about it. But when I’m on deadline, getting paid to think hard about the sport, I’m not taking time out to ponder how I love Michelin tires on my ride. It’s bad form, especially for someone like me who doesn’t ride at all. Of course, if I ever found a sponsor willing to buy me a disclaimer, no telling what might happen. None of the OEMs that MO deals with want to sully their reputations by sponsoring the likes of me, and who can blame them?
What my readers expect from me is an objective accounting of events up to and including the race, delivered with as many laughs as I can haul out of th
So, we will call the 2016 season the way we see it. At this juncture, it looks like Vinales is going to be a top four guy, and even Redding, taking to the Duc like a duc to water, is sniffing around the top of the timesheets. Pedrosa looks miserable, Marquez desperate to stay on the bike with any pace at all, and Rossi sounding unconvincingly like all the changes work in his favor. Lorenzo, meanwhile, has that look in his eye. As he learned in 2011 and 2013, however, the look in the eye thing doesn’t necessarily get you a repeat, a threepeat or a fourpeat.
Late-Braking MotoGP 
