Quartararo: We need to be more aggressive with penalties, MotoGP is like Moto3!

‘There’s no need to stay in the middle… I really don’t agree with this’ - MotoGP champion Fabio Quartararo has called for harsh penalties to be handed out for riders who unnecessarily impede those on flying laps.

Robert Jones

13 May 2022

Quartararo, who finished day-one of his home MotoGP sixth on combined times, feels MotoGP is becoming like Moto3, when it should instead be setting an example.

Several riders were again caught out by those either aborting a fast lap and staying on the racing line or riders who were on an out lap - one example was Alex Rins who was visibly annoyed after getting impeded by Pol Espargaro in FP2.

Rins wasn’t the only one affected as Quartararo claimed race control needs to be ‘more aggressive with penalties’.

When asked if the premier class has become similar to Moto3, and therefore problematic in time attack situations, Quartararo said: "Yes, it's already a problem, but when riders look at you and stay in the… Like, if someone makes a mistake, there's no need to stay in the middle if you have someone behind that you are really disturbing.

"I don’t really agree with this and also for example, when I was in Moto3, my example was MotoGP riders and if we start to do this for sure Moto3 will do the same. And at the end they penalise a lot the Moto3 but they never penalise in MotoGP.

"I’ve never seen a rider penalised for it in MotoGP apart from Jack [Miller] in Argentina with me. I think we need to be more aggressive [with penalties for this], not only in qualifying, but also in free practice."

To Quartararo’s point, penalties regularly get handed out in Moto3 as the lightweight class has had the issue of riders touring on the racing line for many years.

However, the same treatment doesn’t seem to be applied when it comes to MotoGP, therefore every weekend seemingly involves some degree of blocking of other riders, whether it be intentional or not.

New swingarm ‘good’ but Quartararo unsure whether to take the ‘risk’

As he did during the Jerez test, Quartararo was testing Yamaha’s new swingarm during Friday practice at Le Mans. And although it was characterised as ‘good’, the French rider is unsure whether the improvement is enough to warrant a change.

Quartararo added: "That's what I tried today in the second run. It was a little bit the same comment as Jerez. It’s good, but you don't know if it's better or not to take the risk [or stick with] something that you know is working all the time.

"We will check the data but my first impression is we will stay with the standard for tomorrow."

‘I did a mistake’ - Andrea Dovizioso's struggles continue

While Quartararo was fast and already appears to be a contender for victory, Dovizioso is far from that after finishing 20th.

The Italian claimed yellow flags cost him the chance to set a representative time attack, while difficulties with the medium tyre were a cause for being down the order in the first place.

"Unfortunately, I couldn’t do the fast lap with the soft tyre in the afternoon, because there have been a lot of yellow flags and on the last lap, I did a mistake," said Dovizioso. "I could do better, for sure.

"I’m still happy to feel the soft with more potential, because I was struggling a bit too much with the medium rear.

"For tomorrow, everybody will be focused more on the soft rear and this might be the race tyre as well. But let’s see.

"With the medium, I’m pretty good, but I don’t feel that confident on maximum [lean] angle, so I expected a bit more. Tomorrow everybody will use a different tyre anyway, so we have to wait and see what we can do."

Like Dovizioso, Franco Morbidelli had another tough day as he crashed twice. The first fall came during FP1 at turn 11, before a second crash occurred at turn 10 during the final seconds of FP2.

While Morbidelli was slightly higher than we’ve seen of late - finished 12th on combined times - the Italian was still four tenths off Quartararo.

Describing the track as ‘peculiar’ Morbidelli summed up his day by saying: "The conditions were a bit peculiar. There were a lot of crashes today. But speaking about myself, we've also today been working to improve my feeling.

"Actually, towards the end of the day we found a decent feeling so I could make a decent lap time and get closer to the best Yamaha, which is Fabio [Quartararo]. So, good things today. We will try to step it up even more tomorrow. I'm feeling pretty confident."