With the removal of the Finnish Grand Prix due to incomplete homologation work at the Kymi Ring, MotoGP has a much longer break. It will not race once in July and it will next be on track in a little under a month at Silverstone.
Eleven races are complete. The series is well into its European leg of the season. Nine race remain spread over three different continents, and it will all take place over the final three months of the season.
The season began with surprises but has settled into a pattern of late. Only five riders have won in the first half of the season, but four manufactures have produced a winner, including one for the first time. With the events of the Dutch TT fresh in everyone's mind, we are in the summer break with a little more uncertainty than expected a few rounds ago.
Where do we stand?
Through 11 races, Fabio Quartararo is on pace to successfully defend his world championship. Quartararo has won three races and leads the championship with 172 points. He had finished in the points of every race this season prior to his accidents at the Dutch TT.
Built on the back of his first career grand prix victory, Aleix Espargaró is second in the championship with 151 points riding for Aprilia. Espargaró has finished on the podium in five races and has eight top five finishes. Johann Zarco is top Ducati rider with 114 points, but Zarco still does not have a grand prix victory. He has three podium finishes.
Francesco Bagnaia has three victories but has retired from four races and he has no other podium finishes. Bagnaia has 106 points, one more than Enea Bastianini, who also has three victories, but outside of those victories his next best finish is eighth and Bastianini has retired from three races.
Brad Binder was runner-up in the Qatar season opener and the KTM rider had not finished in the top five until his fifth-place ride in the Netherlands. Binder has 93 points, two more than Jack Miller, who has stood on the podium three times this year.
Suzuka riders Joan Mir and Álex Rins are eighth and ninth in the championship with 75 points and 71 points respectively. Miguel Oliveira won in Indonesia, but he is tenth in the championship on 70 points, eight more points than Jorge Martín, who was runner-up twice in the first half of the season.
While Aprilia has Espargaró was second in the championship, Maverick Viñales is 12th in the championship with 62 points. Viñales' best finish just came at Assen when he was third. Two points behind Viñales is Marc Márquez, who has six points but has missed five races due to injuries.
Was Assen only a brief slip for Fabio Quartararo?
For the moment, but we know Quartararo has experienced slumps before. The last season-and-a-half suggest he has everything under control and this will be an isolated incident. Every rider goes over the limit at some point in a season. He did it twice at Assen. That performance will not repeat anywhere else.
Even with this slip up, the Frenchman still has a 21-point lead. Granted, it has brought Espargaró within a race victory of overtaking the championship but consider if Quartararo had stayed upright in the last round, his championship lead would probably have been around the 34-point range, as it was after the German Grand Prix. He could have lost a few points, but still had over a race worth of points between him and second, or he could have extended his advantage and possibly been 40 points in the clear.
Quartararo is sitting pretty and the first 11 races tell me someone has to be flawless to prevent him from earning a second crown.
Can anyone be a serious challenger?
Espargaró put together a breathtaking recovery ride at Assen after being caught in Quartararo's first incident and being forced off course. He went from outside the points to fourth with a stellar move in the final set of corners.
The only thing with Espargaró is when at his best Quartararo has found a way to be better. Consider the four-race stretch where Espargaró was third in all four races. How did Quartararo do?
First, second, fourth, second.
Espargaró scored 64 points in that run. Quartararo scored 78. There is 14 points right there. The Frenchman has finished ahead of Espargaró in seven of 11 races. It doesn't feel like Quartararo is going to slip enough to allow Espargaró through. At minimum, the Spaniard will need to finish ahead of Quartararo in at least seven races and Espargaró would need to average outscoring him by around five points in those races.
I don't think Zarco can do it. I just don't see it. He needs to at least win a race first, but he is 58 points back. Even with one victory he will need some help.
Bagnaia is the interesting one. We should first note that Bagnaia was arrested earlier this week for drunk driving in Ibiza. It is unclear if this incident will carry any on-track repercussions. In terms of racing, it was boom or bust for the Italian in the second quarter of the season. He fell out of contending positions at Le Mans, Barcelona and Sachsenring. Even average finishes would have him much closer to Quartararo than the 66 points he is down now. There cannot be any more mistakes from Bagnaia, and he will have to win at least half of the remaining schedule.
Bastianini might also have three victories, but he has excelled at the high-speed circuits where the year-old Ducati shines, and I am not sure he is set up for a run at the top spot in the final nine races. This can still be considered a good year for him even if a title push does not happen.
How is Suzuki doing considering its eminent exit from MotoGP?
Fine, but things do not feel right. They are eighth and ninth in the championship. Rins is falling all the time. Mir has good days but even he is stumbling more often than we saw over the prior two seasons. Yet, eighth and ninth feel right for these two. Outside of Rins finishing runner-up at Austin, there hasn't been a race that has gotten away from Suzuki.
The bike isn't quite on the same page as the Yamaha and the Ducati, and with how Espargaró is riding, it is a tad behind the Aprilia, though not insurmountably behind.
Suzuki can win a race. It can have its day in the second half of the season. It is sad to see Suzuki leaving, again. It has made great strides in its last eight season. MotoGP is losing out with Suzuki's exit, and nothing is going to change corporation's mind.
Are you sad for Marc Márquez?
Of course! Between the arm injuries and diplopia, the last three seasons have been excruciating for one of the best riders of all-time. It is a loss for everyone. Márquez is suffering and his dominance has been abruptly ended after six championships in seven MotoGP seasons.
However, there are always positives with Márquez and signs the talent is still there and at its highest quality. He has 60 points form six starts. At that points rate, he would be fourth in the championship, four behind Zarco and four ahead of Bagnaia, had he started all 11 races.
If Márquez had started all 11 races, would he really be on 110 points? Probably not, but I think he would be in the top five of the championship and probably have a victory.
With how much he has been beaten up, I do wonder if his skill cannot overcome the deficits the Honda bike has regularly shown with other riders, but Márquez is still doing more with it than anyone else.
We don't know if he will be back in 2022. It seems likely, but we just want Márquez healthy and to get another fair share of time at the highest level of motorcycle racing.
Who has an outside chance of climbing up the championship standings?
The title is out of the question for these folks, but they could make a serious move forward.
Jack Miller will be leaving for KTM next year, but Miller could end on a strong note and move from seventh in the championship to possibly in the top three. When he is off, he has been in another zip code this season. With three Ducati riders ahead of him in the championship, Miller could be motivated to at least get amongst those three and not look average.
Maverick Viñales is 11th in the championship and his third at Assen was his first top five finish of this season. The Aprilia is competitive. Viñales has been stellar at points of his career and then we have seen immaturity overcome him. He can pull himself up the championship with smooth races and not trying to reach for more than is in his grasp.
Who is overachieving?
How is Brad Binder sixth in the championship? He was second in Qatar, but outside of that, and Miguel Oliveira's victory in the wet in Indonesia, KTM hasn't been that great. KTM hasn't been bad, but I am not sure Binder is sixth. He does have 16 points between him and Mir in eighth. Binder could fall a little bit, but he should remain in the top ten of the championship.
Fifteenth in the championship might not sound like much, but Luca Marini had four consecutive top ten finishes before Assen, and Marini finished fifth in Germany. In a sense, the entire VR46 Racing Team is overachieving. Marco Bezzecchi is 14th and he was runner-up at Assen.
Who is underachieving?
If Espargaró is second in the championship, it is hard to look at Viñales with his reputation and not think he should be much better than 12th. It wasn't long ago nine out of ten people would say Viñales was the better rider than Espargaró and it wasn't close. It isn't all that close now but it is Espargaró on top.
The same can be said about Oliveira at KTM. If Binder is sixth, Oliveira should be much better. The last two years have been puzzling for Oliveira. Last year, he had a three-race burst of results: second, first, second. He was fifth in the next race and then didn't finish in the top ten again, only scoring nine points over the final nine races. In 2020, Oliveira won twice and looked like the emerging KTM leader. With Jack Miller joining the program, the Austrian make has decided it needs a new man to lead the charge.
Honda has been lost, but it cannot be all on Márquez's shoulders. Pol Espargaró had bursts in testing and it appeared he could have Honda in a respectable position. Espargaró was third in Qatar but hasn't finished in the top ten since. It wasn't that long ago nine out of ten people would say Pol was the better Espargaró brother and it wasn't close. It isn't all that close now but it is Aleix on top.
Neither LCR Honda rider is all that competitive. Takaaki Nakagami isn't nearly as consistent as he was a few years. Álex Márquez never quite shows the pace. At least both bikes regularly finish in the points but are also regularly outside the top ten.
Is Yamaha Good?
I ask because Quartararo leads the championship but factory teammate Franco Morbidelli is 19th and his only top ten finish was a seventh at Indonesia. The WithU Yamaha team has its riders 21st and 22nd in the championship. WithU was a late addition to replace Petronas SRT, Darryn Binder moved up from Moto3, a significant leap, and Andrea Dovizioso did spend a year out of racing, but they have one top ten finish, a tenth at Indonesia with Binder.
Doesn't this feel like Márquez and Honda all over again? One rider with the bike specially built around him and the rest of the riders uncompetitive. It isn't a case of Morbidelli is 12th in the championship and at least pulls out the top five finishes here and there while regularly scoring points. Morbidelli has been outside the top ten in majority of the races. That shouldn't be the case with Yamaha and with a rider of Morbidelli's ability.
With a possible championship fight against multiple riders, Yamaha is the least prepared to provide support compared to Ducat and even Aprilia. What a strange thing to be writing 11 races into this season.
Who does the second half of the season favorite?
We know Quartararo can close out a championship. The tracks are different this year. Motegi, Buriram, Phillip Island and Sepang are back. In 2019, he was second, second, retired and seventh at those tracks. He has been stout at Misano though victory has eluded him, won at Silverstone last year, but Yamaha has struggled at Aragón and Austria.
Bagnaia, on the other hand, ended 2021 in sensational form. He won at Aragón, Misano and Valencia, and was runner-up at the Red Bull Ring after leading majority of the Austrian Grand Prix before the rain came and Brad Binder pulled off a stunning victory on slick tires while most of the leaders had swapped to their wet weather bikes. As for the Asia-Pacific tracks, Bagnaia won at Buriram and Motegi in Moto2 and won at Sepang six years ago in Moto3.
Espargaró is having a career season and this is his first season on a first-class bike. He is regularly good at Aragón. Silverstone is far from his best course and the same can be said for Phillip Island and Sepang. He has been respectable at Valencia.
I say there is a slight edge to Bagnaia over Quartararo in the final nine races, but with the current gap between the two, Quartararo's historic form should be enough to bring home another championship, but it is far from a certainty.
