Martin’s long lap penalty in Austrian MotoGP sprint ‘not necessary’

Ducati’s Francesco Bagnaia thinks the long lap penalty his MotoGP title rival Jorge Martin received for going off track and cutting a chicane in the Austrian Grand Prix sprint was ‘not necessary’.

Bagnaia and Martin were engaged in a tough duel on the second lap at Spielberg when the Pramac rider couldn’t stop his bike in time and had to go straight at the Turn 2 chicane, where an escape road is carefully laid out to allow riders to rejoin the track.

Although Martin did back off and give way to Bagnaia when he rejoined, he failed to slow down by a second as required by the regulations, and was penalised with a long lap penalty.

As a result, the Spaniard lost his chance of battling for the win and finished the race almost five seconds off the lead, while Bagnaia romped to his third sprint win of 2024 to draw level with him in the championship standings. 

Martin has since called for a review of the long lap penalty rule.

Speaking afterwards, the two-time MotoGP champion Bagnaia felt the stewards did play by the rules while issuing the penalty, but also emphasised that Martin had already lost time by going off track.

“Jorge made a mistake that cost him everything,” he said. “[But] by cutting the way he did he already lost time, so I don’t think the penalty was necessary.

“But that’s the way the rules are, and you have to follow them.”

Bagnaia revealed that he had tactfully braked aggressively into the right-left sequence that is only part of the Red Bull Ring’s MotoGP layout, knowing that Martin would run wide in an attempt to stay ahead of him.

TV images showed the rear wheel of the Pramac Ducati going up in the air in a half-stoppie as the Spaniard desperately tried to get the bike stopped in his failed attempt to make the corner.

“He exited well from corner 1, I exited super good [as well],” he explained. “So I just decided to go on the outside and then I said, ‘now I will brake like a qualifying. If he want to brake like me, he will go wide, absolutely, for sure’. He did it and he was wide.

“For sure when you cut the chicane you are already losing time but the rules are rules, you have to give back one second and he didn’t.

“From that moment I just decided to understand everything about the race perfectly. I just decided to go more smooth as possible to prepare the race for tomorrow.

“We have already…