Fabio Quartararo adamant that he doesn’t “deserve the long lap penalty “ after watching the replay
Fabio Quartararo initially thought that he deserved the long lap penalty handed to him.
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Fabio Quartararo (Via @YamahaMotoGP on X)
The Austrian GP sprint races had tons of drama for fans to witness. Fabio Quartararo and Yamaha have been in a tense situation for the past few days and a good result would have done plenty for them. However, after turn 1 chaos during Saturday’s Austrian GP sprint race, the Frenchman was left in a difficult situation. After Jorge Martin’s incident, Fabio was sent into recovery mode.
During the 14 lap sprint race at the Red Bull Ring, Fabio Quartararo faced a lot of difficulties. Having started the race in 9th place, the Frenchman tumbled down the order in the opening lap and fell down to 20th place. From that point, he went on a recovery drive to 15th. However, he was forced to serve a long lap penalty for his collision with Aprilia wildcard Lorenzo Savadori.
Fabio Quartararo initially felt that he deserved the long lap penalty. However, his thoughts changed after he reviewed the footage of the same. “Before looking at the images, I felt like I deserved the long lap,” he said in an interview. “But looking at the image, I feel I don’t deserve the penalty. But that’s not my job, my job is just to ride at my 100%. When you are struggling so much to overtake, you have to find a way. It happens,” he continued.
Yamaha still hasn’t been able to improve its top speed, causing a disadvantage for Fabio Quartararo
It has been observed that Yamaha’s Achilles heel is quite possibly their top speed on the straights. Other manufacturers, such as Ducati and KTM, have been able to easily pass the Yamahas on straights, putting them at a disadvantage. On top of that, the 2023 season has been a total failure so far for Yamaha’s title campaign. This had caused Fabio to have second thoughts about his future with the team.
Fabio Quartararo also refused to talk about his situation during the first lap of the sprint. It has been clear that the Frenchman is far from his hopes of winning the MotoGP championship in 2023. Meanwhile, Pecco Bagnaia and Ducati seem to be running away with it. Marco Bezzecchi also has been deemed as one of the contenders. It will be interesting to see what happens during Sunday’s main race.
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Varad Joshi
(940 Articles Published)