Repsol Honda Team’s Marc Marquez crashed whilst fighting for the podium in today’s Malaysian Grand Prix, his second race crash in s many races. The World Champion remounted his RC213V to finish 11th.
The 2016 Malaysian Grand Prix will likely rank amongst the Spaniard’s most difficult race weekend. Marquez has been suffering from gastroenteritis this past week, which affected him a great deal on Friday and Saturday. Despite feeling really unwell, the Honda rider managed to qualify fourth quickest and had displayed a strong race pace.
Marquez went for a slightly unusual brake set-up for the race. Usually in the wet riders run steel brakes because carbon brakes require a lot of heat to work, but the Spaniard opted to run the carbon discs despite the conditions. This meant that he was a little off the pace at the start of the race whilst his brakes came up to temperature, but by lap seven he was setting the timing screens alight.
His time spent bringing his brakes up to working range allowed him to conserve his rubber too, with an eye on being stronger later in the race. By the 10th lap, Marquez was right on the tail of the top three and was looking massively menacing. His charge came to an end on lap 12 when he lost the front of his Honda at Turn 11.
Twitter: #MM93 goes down for the second week in a row!! He’s trying to rejoin!
#MalaysianGP https://t.co/iQuJIN5Kmn (@MotoGP)
The World Champion’s bike wasn’t badly damaged and he rejoined the race, taking the chequered flag in 11th. He doesn’t attribute the crash to his choice of brake material, which he is adamant was the right choice for the race. Luckily, the incident has no bearing on the outcome of the championship and he vows to learn from this type of mistake for next year.
“Today was a difficult day. In the morning the weather was already unstable and finally the race was in the wet. Before the start I decided to use the carbon disc brakes, which gave me the chance to be stronger in braking. It was the right choice and it has nothing to do with my crash,” said Marquez.
“At the beginning of the race I was riding quite comfortably in the leading group, trying to save the tires for the end of the race, but suddenly I crashed by losing the front at Turn 11. I thought I had a chance to finish on the podium here, but it was not to be, and it is better that this happens now that we already have the title. This experience will help us for next year and helps us appreciate the World Championship even more.”
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