2022 Portimão MotoGP Report

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Fabio Quartararo shows how it’s done. The defending world champion (the first Frenchman, by the way, to ever hold the premier-class title) hasn’t had a win since the end of last August, but in Portugal he showed the paddock he’s still a force to contend with. (MotoGP/)

If the Yamahas are slow this year, with eight miles per hour less top end than the Ducatis, then how do we explain the Portuguese Grand Prix where somehow Fabio Quartararo emerged from the mist of two rainy practice days to qualify fifth, make a strong start, and win a dry race by 5.4 seconds? Second and third were Johann Zarco (Ducati) and Aleix Espargaró (Aprilia).

Crashes were numerous all weekend, especially in the wet-but-drying mixed conditions of Q1. Quartararo had said, “…in my opinion it was dangerous to lap in Q1…”

Jack Miller, who had crashed in FP1, said of qualifying in mixed conditions, “…you first have to do a full lap with the wet tires…to understand where the wet areas are and then where to go with the slicks.” Notable in that thought: He takes for granted that riders will memorize the locations of the puddles and wet patches in one lap.

Last year, the Yamaha of Quartararo won early, while the Ducatis finished the season strong. Will that be the case in 2022 as well? Quartararo holds off Johann Zarco at present, but Zarco finished second, showing he’s a genuine threat. (MotoGP/)

The lack of dry practice time made starting well forward on the grid even more important than usual, and the pressure on riders having to push through the tricky mixed conditions of Q1 was very high.

Race day was dry, and Quartararo himself seems to have been surprised by his own speed. “…Today I impressed myself quite a lot to make almost all the race in minute-thirty-nines.

“It’s true the bike is missing a lot of top speed, but in this track I was feeling not bad with the top speed because in the last corners I was exiting super fast and out of the hill I was trying to manage not a lot of wheelie and I was super strong there.”

Earlier in the weekend he had distinguished his own view—that the Yamaha lacks power—from that of other Yamaha riders (notably wise elder statesman Andrea Dovizioso), who believe the bike lacks rear grip.

Yet here, today, Quartararo wins with that grip. His opinion?

“…if you check our riding style it’s much more like—I am exaggerating—Moto3 style.”

Jack Miller was another Portimão DNF. He and Joan Mir tried to outbrake each other. Miller lost the front, and both went down. (MotoGP/)

“Moto3 Style” vs. Steer With the Rear

This is important because others also say that Quartararo does not use the rear tire to steer his bike as do so many riders. “Moto3 style” means high corner speed, required in Moto3 because the engines make only about 55 hp. In Quartararo’s case it’s not the lack of power but having to preserve the rear tire that prevents him from steering with the throttle.

He continued, saying, “[My style is] much more round lines. When you see all the other bikes they are doing much more like a V in the turns, and I think this is the biggest difference between our bike and the other bikes.”

Several years ago, Cal Crutchlow referred to “Honda’s V-shaped line,” the special tool that Marc Márquez devised as a tire-conservation style in Moto2—entering the turn on a moderate lean angle that doesn’t overwork the tire edges, then dropping down to elbow level just in the vicinity of the apex and completing most of the turning there in a short time and at a lower apex speed. At the exit, lift and accelerate to recover a high speed.

While Quartararo’s “more round lines” do work the tender tire edges all the way around the corner instead of just at the “point of the V,” the rider is not also feeding extra heat into the rear by making it steer as well—that task moves to the front.

Aprilia’s Maverick Viñales rounded out the top 10 in the overall finishers, a classic example of a rider and bike whose strengths are not complementary. (MotoGP/)

Jorge Lorenzo, formerly the foremost exponent of the big round corner line, couldn’t make it work on every track. Can Quartararo continue the success he had in Portugal? Or will the Honda, Suzuki, and Ducati riders on new-this-year bikes soon zero in on mature setups that carry them out of Yamaha’s reach? Last year, Quartararo amassed points in the first half of the season, while the Ducati men gained strength and points in the second.

Naturally the other Yamaha riders also lack rear grip—the Yamaha is built long and low to be stable near the side-grip limit. This means it’s less able to transfer weight to the rear during the hard acceleration point-and-shoot riders need to recover the exit speed that corner-speed riders carry all the way through big turns. As a result, the bike spins rather than accelerates.

Suzuki’s Ride-Height Charge

The fast starter and early race leader was Suzuki’s Joan Mir, but here came Quartararo, past second-placed Zarco (Ducati). The other Suzuki of Álex Rins, starting in a dismal 23rd (he ran out of time in qualifying and fell afoul of a yellow flag), had made up an astounding 13 places on the first lap. Part of this transformation (Suzukis did not always get such starts!) is because the team now have their acceleration-increasing variable ride height system working well, transforming their bikes into dragsters on demand. Also, although the extra power Suzuki has brought for 2022 initially compromised their tire life, it now seems under better control. Remember how often last year a rider starting from downfield would say “I burned up my tires in passing other riders.” Not Rins!

At the start of lap four, Quartararo led from turn 1 and moved clear of Mir, setting a new record of 1:39.435 on lap ten. His lap-time consistency made it clear he was riding well within his comfort zone, and reminded me of the 500 two-stroke GP racing era, in which so often one rider with a superior setup pulled away to a secure lead and then cruised to the win.

Now came racing’s randomness as the advancing Miller and Mir dueled on brakes into turn 1. Miller’s front tire lost grip and the two men were down (without injury). This placed Espargaró (Aprilia) in third. Rins, continuing his impossible climb from starting almost last, was now in fourth, followed by KTM’s Miguel Oliveira.

Honda’s Marc Márquez finished sixth in Portugal, clearly still not at 100 percent, but looking better. (MotoGP/)

It is interesting to me that most discussion of this year’s MotoGP events centers on “the usual suspects”—Ducati’s red army and the Hondas—and most especially on Marc Márquez, who finished sixth after qualifying ninth (this thanks to misadventures similar to those of Rins). He had conserved energy as usual through practice, and limited his exposure to crashing and a possible recurrence of double vision.

“Today we did not have the feeling.

“…the speed of our rivals was more than we had.”

At Portimão riders continued to speak of MotoGP “returning to normal” during the coming European rounds, but the mechanisms that have made the first races unusual aren’t over with—for example, the expected maturing of the 2022 Ducati and Honda. Here, Márquez said, “…we have no reference here—we cannot use the data from the 2021 because it is a new bike.”

Suzuki’s Potential

The potential of the Suzukis—their old consistency supplemented by their newfound acceleration plus newly civilized extra power—is something that looks well able to continue upsetting “normality.” And what will happen when Aleix Espargaró finds himself on a track where the Aprilia’s powerful turning works as it should?

Maverick Viñales, on the other hand, finds himself a point-and-shoot rider imprisoned in an Aprilia engineered for turning grip.

He says, “We have to make sure that the bike accommodates me and can use my style,” but we also know you can’t transform a bike of one style into the other with just a ride-height gauge and clickers.

Will “normality” return on May first at Jerez?

Ducati’s Enea Bastianini, who had the point lead going into Portugal, crashed out and moved down the ranking to fourth. (MotoGP/)

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