After a long mid-season break, MotoGP returns this weekend for the British Grand Prix and the start of a 12-race rush to the chequered flag in November.
Reigning champion Francesco Bagnaia resumes at the top of the title standings in what’s shaping up to be a golden year for Ducati, but that means his biggest threat is friendly fire. Bagnaia’s two closest challengers are also on Italian bikes — one on identical machinery, one on his 2022 title-winning frame — and proved before the break that they’re up for the fight.
But KTM is looming large, powered in part by Jack Miller’s superb first eight races in orange leathers. The Australian’s switch to the Austrian marque has been a dream, with the team enjoying an uptick in competitiveness that’s put him in podium and victory contention well ahead of schedule.
Meanwhile the silly season is in full swing, with one rider already rolling the dice on an escape from Honda. Could Marc Márquez be next?
Here’s what we’re looking forward to in the second half of the MotoGP season.
JACK MILLER’S IN PURSUIT OF HIS FIRST KTM VICTORY
If another bike is going to win a race in the second phase of the championship, by rights it must be a KTM.
The Austrian marque has taken a stunning step forward this season to be the all-conquering Desmosedici’s closest challenger and hold second in the manufacturers championship.
With 12 rounds still to go, including seven outside of Europe and the wildcard of a new race in India, surely the Italian brand can’t keep up the formidable streak.
And on the day things don’t click, as they surely must at some point, it’s hard to go past KTM as the team that’ll be there to clean up.
In which case Miller could be in the frame to not only pick up his first win in orange but also make himself the first rider in the MotoGP era to win for three different manufacturers.
“It’s been an unreal start to my time here at KTM.” Miller wrote on his website during the break. “We’ve had a bike fighting there every weekend, whether that’s myself, Brad (Binder) or even (Gas Gas rider) Augusto (Fernandez).
“I’ve had two sprint race podiums and a main race podium and we’ve been challenging the majority of the time.
“We definitely can be very happy with what the bike is doing, and it feels like KTM is definitely on the right path.”
Miller’s strength has been accessing the bike’s maximum performance in qualifying. Excluding his two Q1 knockouts, his average grid position is 4.8, on the second row. He’s twice started from the front row and has already led several races.
While he’s scored points regularly in both sprints and on Sundays, rounding out his grand prix performances is the missing piece. Even then, he’s behind only one non-Ducati rider in the champions standings — teammate Binder.
It was as recently as the end of last year he executed that silky-smooth ride to dominant victory in Japan. He’s capable of it. Surely the breakthrough isn’t far away.
THE DUCATI BATTLE FOR SUPREMACY
Ducati may be walking to the title, but at least it has eight bikes to keep the battle at the front interesting, with reigning champion Bagnaia being challenged significantly by Jorge Martin and Marco Bezzecchi.
Martin finally pulled himself together for a run of three grand prix podiums, including a pair of sprint weekends, from France to Germany.
Bezzecchi won the French Grand Prix and ended the first half of the season with a sprint win and a Sunday second place.
The two satellite riders — Martin on a 2023-spec bike and Bezzecchi on last year’s model — are separated by just one point in second and third in the standings.
But after a patchy start to the year that saw Bagnaia fail to score on Sunday at three of four weekends, the factory Ducati rider strung together a clean June to close the first half of the campaign. On the podium in every sprint and grand prix, including two Sunday wins, he stretched his title advantage to 35 points.
It’s a handy margin, but with 12 grands prix still to go and 444 points still available, it’s far from a done deal.
That’s especially true thanks to the wildcard in the pack: teammate Enea Bastianini. Having missed the first five grands prix with injury, Bastianini will be full fit on the bike for the rest of the campaign.
We all remember how he kept his year-old Gresini bike in title contention until the final rounds of last year. We might finally now get a glimpse of that potentially combustible factory partnership we all expected.
HONDA’S HARD SELL FOR MÁRQUEZ
Marc Márquez looked happy in the MotoGP paddock for the first time in months. Not only is he fully fit again, but one might cynically argue it’s been long enough between rounds that he’s forgotten just how bad the Honda has been.
This is the Honda bike that has left him unable to finish a single grand prix this year and has seen him skip five rounds with injury.
Honda’s condition is so dire that there’s widespread rumour it could be set to suffer a rider exodus before the end of the year. Álex Rins has already signed a deal to ride for Yamaha in 2024, and there’s speculation Joan Mir is looking for an exit from the factory team.
Even the future of the entire LCR operation is in doubt, with KTM having already made one pass at bringing the satellite squad into its orbit.
The Honda bike won’t have become competitive over the break, and it’s unlikely to make any significant progress before the end of the year — the team itself has admitted that. The road back is long.
But Honda can’t afford to lose Marc Márquez. The loss of one rider after a single year — with potentially more to come — is sufficiently demoralising for this proud team. Losing Márquez, with whom the factory squad has achieved so much, would be a psychological body blow.
Honda’s job is therefore not to pretend the road back is shorter than it is; it’s to prove it’s at least on that road to begin with.
The European season ends in Misano on 10 September, after which there’s a test to which teams will bring key upgrades targeting next season.
It could be Honda’s best and maybe last chance to save its relationship with Márquez — if the first half of the year hasn’t already put it beyond repair.
BIG RIDER MARKET MOVES
Rins’s decision to join Yamaha was the first piece of a complex puzzle to what was supposed to be a quieter mid-cycle rider market.
Franco Morbidelli is now the key free agent, and he’s out to prove he’s worthy of a MotoGP stay.
He’s already upped his game this season, matching more closely with teammate Fabio Quartararo. It’s been enough to keep the faith with Valentino Rossi, who will be determined to see the 2020 championship runner-up remain on the grid.
But it’s not clear where or how.
Marco Bezzecchi is another key piece that could shake up the market. There’s talk that Ducati could hand him a factory bike at VR46, but the Rossi-backed team is speculated to be set for a 2025 Yamaha switch, in which case Bezzecchi might escape Bologna’s grasp. Moving him to Pramac now might be the preferred option.
In which case the experienced Johann Zarco is out of a ride. Does he take that experience to LCR? Does he end up back at Gresini — in which case how does Tony Arbolino find his way into the sport?
And then there’s the question of KTM finding space for its five riders.
Pol Espargaró and Augusto Fernández are both under contract at Gas Gas, but Pedro Acosta has also been promised a ride. The KTM CEO has suggested he’d be willing to buy a satellite team if that’s what it took.
That’s a lot of wheeling and dealing in a limited amount of time until the end of the season.
A NEW DESTINATION — AND THE AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX
The 12 remaining races will come thick and fast between now at the last weekend of November, with several highlights among them.
Silverstone, Spielberg, Barcelona and Misano will close the European season, after which MotoGP will make its first visit to India for the latest chapter in the sport’s eastwards expansion.
The race will take place at the Buddh International Circuit, around 50 kilometres southeast of New Delhi. A little over a decade old, it was designed for Formula 1 but effectively mothballed after only three races.
But following warmly received debuts in similarly motorcycle-mad destination like Thailand and Indonesia, MotoGP is hoping it can make better used of Buddh than its four-wheel counterpart.
The classic Japanese Grand Prix follows in Motegi before the a triple header comprising Indonesia, Australia and Thailand.
The Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit in Victoria is one of MotoGP’s all-time great tracks, a perpetual favourite among riders and fans and a place that never fails to serve up a classic race, usually with an unpredictable result. The sport arrives Down Under in just 77 days.
Qatar will return to the calendar in the penultimate slot — it will be back in its regular season-opening position next season following massive infrastructure upgrades — and the year will conclude on 26 November in Valencia.
WHAT ABOUT THIS WEEKEND?
The British Grand Prix is always a MotoGP highlight, with Silverstone typically providing excellent action.
The secret is the track layout, which offers a something for every bike on the grid. It is in parts super-fast, with long straights and rapid corners. Elsewhere it puts great emphasis on cornering dynamics, throwing a bone to the bikes that aren’t keeping up in the horsepower race. It’s also wide enough to offer multiple lines through corners, which makes it a great circuit for racing.
Ducati, Suzuki and Yamaha have split wins in recent years despite the Italian-made bike having had dramatically different strengths and weaknesses to the Japanese machines.
Weather usually plays a role in shaking up the order too — and there’s rain on the radar for all three days.
Most of the year’s long-term injured riders are back and fully fit this weekend, including Pol Espargaró, who’s been out since the season-opening race in Portugal, where he suffered a horrific crash during practice that’s kept him sidelined until now. Only Álex Rins remains sidelined with a broken leg.
This weekend will also see the introduction of two key rule changes.
The first is to make only second practice on Friday count for direct access to Q2 to satisfy concerns that the impetus to set a fast lap time in P1, before setting up the bike, was dangerous.
The sport will also enforce minimum tyre pressures from this weekend. Bikes will now have to be above a minimum pressure for 30 per cent of the sprint and 50 per cent of the grand prix or risk a penalty.
Michelin has introduced the rule on safety grounds, but some riders who already struggle with high pressures in traffic have warned it will only further exacerbate their grip problems. Others, like Jack Miller, say KTM has a firm handle on tyre usage.
From this weekend only time penalties, up to 12 seconds, will be dished out, but eventually disqualification will become the default punishment — so there’s much at stake for those who don’t get this right.
HOW CAN I WATCH IT?
The 2023 British Motorcycle Grand Prix is live and ad-break free during racing on Kayo.
The first practice session runs for 45 minutes from 7:45pm (AEST), followed by a one-hour timed practice session at midnight.
Final practice is at 7:10pm on Saturday before qualifying at 7:50pm and the sprint at midnight.
The Sunday warm-up lasts for 10 minutes from 6:45pm ahead of the British Grand Prix at 10pm.
