How Bagnaia’s task in Barcelona compares to Lorenzo, Hayden turnarounds

Francesco Bagnaia needs more than a victory to come away from the Barcelona Grand Prix as a three-time MotoGP champion. Only some misfortune on Jorge Martin’s part could swing the title battle in his favour in the final round of the season.

The factory Ducati rider rode admirably on Saturday to clinch victory in the sprint and slash Martin’s advantage from 24 points to 19, while establishing himself as the rider to beat at Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya.

Although Bagnaia still has a mountain to climb on Sunday, there have been similar cases where the second-placed rider has pulled off a major upset in the championship showdown.

Perhaps one season the factory Ducati rider could relate to is 2006, when Honda’s young gun Nicky Hayden was battling with Yamaha star Valentino Rossi for the title.

Incidentally, Rossi’s campaign that year was very similar to that of his protege Bagnaia, with the latter winning more races than anyone but also crashing often. Hayden, much like current Pramac rider Martin, was the more consistent of the two title runners despite scoring fewer wins.

A major twist in the championship came when Dani Pedrosa crashed unaided at the penultimate round of the season in Estoril, taking his team-mate Hayden with him.

That left Hayden with a 12-point gap deficit to Rossi going into the season finale, which took place in Valencia the following week.

Rossi qualified on pole for the race while Hayden could only manage fifth on the grid, further boosting the former’s chances of adding another premier class to his tally.

But the pendulum began to swing again at the start of the race, when Rossi dropped to sixth place, directly behind his chief title rival Hayden. Over the next few laps, Hayden continued to inch closer to the front, while Rossi found himself down in seventh.

Then disaster struck on lap 7 when Rossi lost control of his Yamaha at Turn 2, suffering a low-speed crash into the gravel. The Yamaha rider was able to remount on his M1 but valiantly fought back to 13th place, scoring just three championship points in the process.

Up ahead, Hayden held his nerves and crossed the line in third place, overturning a 12-point deficit into a five-point championship triumph. The pictures of a weeping Hayden completing the cooldown lap while holding the American flag have since been etched into motorcycle racing folklore.

His championship triumph was even more…