Franco Morbidelli hit with double long lap penalty; “Unlucky, not irresponsible”
“It was not irresponsible, let’s put it this way. It was unlucky."
Franco Morbidelli must serve a double long lap penalty in Sunday’s British MotoGP.
He was punished by FIM stewards for an incident at Turn 1 of Saturday’s sprint, when he clattered into Marco Bezzecchi, wiping them both out of the race.
Although Pramac’s Morbidelli accepts the stewards’ verdict, he insists it should have been ruled a racing incident.
Morbidelli and Bezzecchi were confirmed as fit after a visit to the medical centre.
Morbidelli explained to media including Crash.net at Silverstone: “Something happened with Maverick [Vinales].
“He had a bad start. He lost many positions, he went to brake, he stopped. I went to brake in a normal spot but couldn’t avoid the crash, couldn’t avoid the impact.
“I crashed into Marco unfortunately. It was an unfortunate episode.
“It was not irresponsible, let’s put it this way. It was unlucky.
“I didn’t want to overtake anybody. I wanted to brake in a normal spot. If you see the images I braked earlier than Miguel Oliveira, but then I got sucked in by Maverick who was at a different speed than everybody.
“I accept what the stewards say.”
Marc Marquez was among the riders to stick up for Morbidelli and insist the incident did not warrant a punishment.
Morbidelli reacted: “The problem is that this is racing. We are going at 200km/h and there are 20 bikes.
“Things like this can happen.
“It was an unfortunate racing incident. It was not an irresponsible riding episode, at all.
“But the stewards have a different opinion and I accept this.”
Morbidelli was asked if the aero of modern MotoGP bikes contributes to clashes like his with Bezzecchi.
“Sure,” he said. “We reach the first corner at a very high speed.
“The air suction makes a lot of difference.
“Luckily, I’m OK and Marco is OK. We are banged but OK.”
Morbidelli lost the opportunity to gather different data for his GP24.
“We had a different set-up for this sprint race to increase our performance. We’ll give it a go tomorrow morning,” he said.
But, Morbidelli’s grand prix at Silverstone on Sunday will now be blighted by a double long lap penalty.
James was a sports journalist at Sky Sports for a decade covering everything from American sports, to football, to F1.
