Pecco Bagnaia’s critical title error did not come in 2024 at all

The 2024 MotoGP season saw, for the second year in succession, a title decider between Jorge Martin and Francesco Bagnaia. Unlike 2023, though, it was decided in favour of Martin, with Bagnaia losing out to a rider much improved over his 2023 version.

On the face of it, Bagnaia and Martin were so evenly matched for so much of both 2023 and 2024 that one title each from the past two seasons is about fair.

However, there’s an argument to be made that there would have been no fight in either year without one key mistake from Bagnaia.

After the Catalan Sprint in 2023, Bagnaia led the championship by 62 points from Martin. He was the only rider remotely close to the pace of the Aprilia riders — Aleix Espargaro and Maverick Vinales — at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya last September, was in the form of his life to that point, and was clearly the class of the field.

But Bagnaia’s crash at turn two — and the acceptable inability of Brad Binder to avoid hitting the Italian as he entered turn three — in last year’s Catalan Grand Prix changed everything.

It is unquestionable that, without that crash, Martin’s job in the final part of the season to close the gap to Bagnaia is much tougher. You could argue, in fact, that, without that crash, Martin never really enters legitimate title contention in 2023.

That he did, in fact, enter title contention, was a direct result of the turn two crash that cost Bagnaia fitness in the following week’s San Marino Grand Prix, and confidence throughout the Asian races which came afterwards.

Sure, there were plenty of other twists and turns throughout 2023, but they only ever mattered because of that Catalunya crash. That crash gave Martin points and, perhaps just as importantly, momentum.

From there until the end of the season, Bagnaia was almost constantly on the back foot, trying to raise himself to Martin’s level — sometimes successfully, other times less so.

It was the mistakes that Martin made in 2023 that won Bagnaia the title, as well as Bagnaia’s own excellence.

Think of the Indonesian Grand Prix crash, the Australian Grand Prix tyre choice, and of course that dramatic conclusion in Valencia which ended in contact with Marc Marquez.

Of course, Martin had his own misfortune, too, most obviously with his Qatar Grand Prix performance that has still never been fully explained, but that didn’t cost him as much as either Indonesia or Valencia.

The key for Martin is that he understood where his shortcomings were in 2023, and improved on those in 2024. 32 podiums from 40 races is a remarkable hit rate, even if he did only win three Grands Prix this year.

Of those eight races he missed the podium, one was in the Texas Sprint on the weekend that Ducati encountered the worst of its rear tyre vibration issues of the season (and where he still beat Bagnaia in both races); another was the Barcelona Sprint where he finished fourth and Bagnaia crashed; four — Spanish Grand Prix, German Grand Prix, Italian Sprint, and Indonesian Sprint — were crashes (and all in races won by Bagnaia);  then there was was the San Marino Grand Prix where Martin was 15th after swapping bikes and Bagnaia was second; and finally Martin was fourth in the Japanese Sprint where he qualified 11th after a Q2 crash.

In the races where Martin crashed, he was leading in Spain, leading in Germany, leading in Indonesia, and second to Bagnaia in Italy. When he pitted for his rain bike in San Marino, Martin was second behind Bagnaia.

Aside from the aforementioned Texas races, Martin was never not a podium contender in 2024, and more often than not he fulfilled that potential.

16 of Martin’s 32 podiums in 2024 were second places, and nine of those races were won by Bagnaia.

What this shows is Martin’s ability to settle, something he didn’t have in 2023 when he was less mature and less sure of his own ability. That immaturity and insecurity led Martin to mistakes like the ones in Indonesia and Australia, but they happened incredibly rarely in 2024.

2023 Martin might’ve tried to chase Marc Marquez in Aragon; 2024 Martin realised Marquez was not the battle. 2023 Martin might’ve pushed on for longer to try to beat Bagnaia in Malaysia; 2024 Martin realised that second was good enough.

There were countless instances of this throughout 2024, and they were the key to Martin’s eventual success — Bagnaia won almost four-times as many GPs as Martin this year, but was almost always the one chasing.

But why was Martin able to show such maturity? A rider who last year thought his way out of a world title.

The answer lies in Catalunya 2023, and Bagnaia’s crash. Pulling Martin into title contention late on allowed Martin to show himself why he was not ready in 2023 to win the title, and therefore the areas on which he needed to work in order to have a better chance in 2024.

If Martin was not within a few points of Bagnaia throughout the closing stages of 2023, he’d have not felt that championship pressure, so wouldn’t have been able to learn and understand how he reacts to it. He’d have been unable to make the improvements he did, in reality, over the winter without the knowledge he acquired in 2023, and would have gone into 2024 with all of the speed, but little of the mentality that was vital to winning the title this year.

Would that have made a difference in the outcome of 2024? Possibly, but it’s impossible to say for sure, of course.

Ultimately, while, in 2023, Bagnaia gave Martin the chance to learn the lessons necessary to win the title in 2024, it was still up to Martin to interpret those lessons in the correct way.

That Martin was victorious in 2024 now, strangely, gives three-times World Champion Bagnaia the chance to learn some of the same lessons.

There is no wondering what cost Bagnaia the title this year. It wasn’t Brad Binder’s ambition in Jerez, a bike issue in Le Mans, or Alex Marquez not looking left in Aragon. It was losing the front in Catalunya, Silverstone, and especially Misano.

Only with time will we see whether Bagnaia can make the same kind of growth as Martin in the upcoming winter.