The Lusail International Circuit is to undergo major renovation work at the end of 2022 and into 2023, to upgrade the facilities and paddock.
As a result, it will relinquish its position as the first race of the MotoGP season, instead being moved back to the end of the year.
With Qatar out of the frame as the first race of 2023, this hugely increases the chances of Phillip Island as the first race of the season.
After the first MotoGP race of 2022, the Qatar Grand Prix was over, an observant Twitter follower asked me why the symbol used for Marc Marquez’ front tire choice was different to everyone else.
Watching the replay and then consulting the analysis PDFs on MotoGP’s new results section made clear what Marquez had done.
He and his team and chosen to fit a soft front tire that had been scrubbed in, and consequently, had been used for one lap already.
Episode 266 of the Paddock Pass Podcast is out, and this one sees us covering the Qatar GP at the Lusail International Circuit outside of Doha.
On the mics to discuss the season-opener, we have the full crew of Steve English, David Emmett, Neil Morrison, and Adam Wheeler, as they look at the first race of the 2022 MotoGP Championship season.
If it has felt like a long wait for the season to get underway again. And Saturday at Qatar showed us just what we have been missing. A surprising FP3, where eight riders managed to improve their lap times, despite the session taking place in the heat of the day, and the wind having picked up and bringing a dusting of sand to the track.
Among those who improved were Enea Bastianini, who jumped up to fifth, threatening Pol Espargaro, Pecco Bagnaia, and Fabio Quartararo. Espargaro and Bagnaia bettered their times, Quartararo did not, setting up another thrilling contest to get out of Q1 and into Q2. If you were looking for drama, you got everything you could have hoped for, and more.
You even got the customary yellow flag drama in qualifying, with laps being canceled due to yellow flags having a significant impact on the grid in all three classes. A yellow flag waved at the end of Q1 for a crash by Darryn Binder meant Johann Zarco had his best lap canceled, put in right at the end of the session.
Although fans don’t like the rule, it was put in place after a couple of horrific incidents, most notably when Tito Rabat had his leg destroyed at Silverstone in 2018 when he was hit by Franco Morbidelli’s bike. The aim is to slow riders down when they see a yellow flag, something which the change has been largely successful in doing. But it comes at the price of laps being canceled.
Whenever an important lap gets canceled, there is an outcry to find a better solution. Unfortunately, a better solution is almost impossible to find. All of the alternatives proposed just introduce other problems, as you would expect when the law of unintended consequences kicks in.
Testing is all well and good, but at last, we have real, actual data from a race track on a bona fide race weekend. All 24 bikes on the track at the same time, trying to figure out as much as possible in two short 45 minute sessions.
No running separately, or trying to figure out how the conditions for the 8-lap run done at 11am compare to the 12-lap run at 2pm, or the 7-lap run at 5pm.
The first day at Qatar may have been genuine competition, but the picture was also confused by the schedule. With FP1 at 1:40pm, in the heat of the day, and FP2 shortly after sunset, at 6pm, conditions were completely different, the air temperature 7°C lower, and the track a whole 16°C cooler.
“Well, for sure now it is hard to see who has the better pace than the other because we don’t have the normal day schedule,” Miguel Oliveira reflected after the first day.”The hour is not that different but for the temperature and the wind it changes quite a lot.”
From time to time, when I stray from talking about motorcycle racing to share something political on Twitter, I am told by some random Twitter user to “stick to bikes”.
What they mean, of course, is that I should not share political opinions or articles they do not agree with, but that’s a different question.
Talking about politics is, of course, still “sticking to bikes.” Circuits have to be built somewhere.
Episode 265 of the Paddock Pass Podcast is out, and this one sees us gearing up for the start of the 2022 MotoGP Championship season.
To get us ready for the weekend’s season-opener, we have the usual crew of Steve English, David Emmett, Neil Morrison, and Adam Wheeler on the mics, as they look at their picks not only for the Qatar GP, but also the 2022 season as a whole.
Episode 197 of the Paddock Pass Podcast is out, and this show is the first of our MotoGP race coverage for the 2021 season.
On the mics, we have our usual crew of Steve English, David Emmett, Neil Morrison, and Adam Wheeler, who discuss in depth the on-track action under the lights of Losail.
Despite racing in Qatar just a weekend prior, the Doha GP proved itself to be a different animal, which the guys discuss.
“I’m so glad to hear that a lot of the riders are confused! Because I am too, I really am.” Franco Morbidelli, like just about everyone in the MotoGP paddock in Qatar, has spent so long trying to get his head around the Losail International Circuit and the tricks it can play, with grip, with wind, with track temperatures, and so much more, that he is utterly lost.
“I don’t know what’s going on. Something is going on, and I hope that whatever is going on, it will go away as soon as possible, because it is tricky to work like this.”
“Consistency has been difficult this weekend because the track is different every time we exit the pits,” Jack Miller agreed. “There’s only one more day left here in Qatar and I’ll try and make it a good one and get out of here in one piece.” After nearly a month in the Gulf state, on and off, and ten days riding around the same track, everyone is very, very over being in Qatar.
Plus ça change… if you put the top four from FP2 of Qatar 1 from a week ago next to the top four of FP2 from today, what difference would you see?
The same four names, with only the names of Johann Zarco and Fabio Quartararo swapped around, the Yamaha rider now fourth instead of third, as he was last week, the lone M1 amid an army of Ducatis.
Even the times are virtually identical: the time difference between Pecco Bagnaia’s second place last week and this is just 0.036. The time difference between the third-place times is 0.038. And the difference between the fourth-place times was 0.003, a mere three thousandths of a second.
One week later, MotoGP is back at the same race track, with the same riders, and likely racing in pretty much the same conditions. Does this mean we are going to see exactly the same result in the Doha Grand Prix as we did for the Qatar Grand Prix?
That will depend. And it will perhaps depend on how well the MotoGP riders learn the lessons of last week, as well as the lessons of the past. If Maverick Viñales maintains the form he showed last Sunday, he will be very difficult to beat.