MotoGP | 2020 | Round 8 | Spain| Catalunya| Sep 25-27

Ya I loled at his pic. Not same character as my profile pic but equally funny lol.

Poor Cal.

Is Marc running this weekend?
Must go adjust my fantasy leagues if so.

 

MM just made a visit and everyone clinched .

 

Quartararo fastest as the top four title contenders fill the top four places during opening practice for the Catalunya MotoGP at Barcelona.

https://www.crash.net/motogp/results/945050/1/catalunya-motogp-barcelona-free-practice-1-results

 

Mir may win this championship

 

Zarco doing the Ducati proud in P2 so apparently this year's Ducati took a step backwards as the other Ducs are P12, P15, P20, P21, and P22. This is just practice of course and P1 to P22 is only about 1.4 seconds, but still that doesn't look good. Those thinking Petricci might make a resurgence this weekend, may want to rethink that as he is dead last.

A Marquez P8, so maybe he is starting to coming to terms with Honda.

Looking like another good race weekend. MM can stay on vacation as long as he wants.

 

Good practices today. Maybe they should get some leaf blowers as part of the track equipment, lol. Does anyone know if Joe Roberts is struggling with anything in particular? P16, second off P1 combined practices.

 

Way to go Binder! 2.3 sec improvement from FP1.

 

the "new to the bike with new michelins" riders seem to be doing better than the established Ducati gild.


MM said the most benefits for Alex would be doing as many laps as possible on the same circuit (with established setup etc.)

 

Interesting for Ducati that Pecco went (for now) from hero to zero with a P20 and Zarco went (for now) from zero to hero with a P2...

 

I'm not reading much into these wild times fluctuations. Riders had been hoarding soft rears in FP1, and only a handful of them brought them out for fast laps at the closing stages of FP2. Many are thinking the soft is good for race distance, so they're making sure they have enough good soft rubber available for the Q and the race.

 

Apparently it's both windy and cold there today, with improving conditions tomorrow. Plus no grip on the surface; so cold tires, head or cross wind, and traction control adjustments all over the place.

 

I'm just going WAG here this time:

Fabio
Paul Asparagus
Nakagami

 

65 degrees for FP1 and 72 degrees for FP2 and only minimal winds - seems damn near ideal conditions for racing to me!

 

Hardly minimal winds....

 

Wind at 15 MPH with 30 MPH gusts. Miller was saying the crosswind after passing the grandstands was pretty epic at 200MPH.

 

That was my point...

 

Weather network located at the track said highest recorded wind gust was 26mph and the average was 16mph - now I've never gone 345kph on a bike before so I'm sure it's a little unnerving but certainly not out of the norm, especially when places like Phillip Island can be double that. Can't see that impeding all out lap times, more so riders using QP2 to work on race settings and used tires.

 

Sorry, my comment was meant to be complimentary to yours, as supporting facts.

I think that besides the speed, riding a bike that is trying to spit you off in the best of conditions, and then adding another variable, be it crosswind, headwind, or whatever, can't be confidence inspiring. We also don't know (ok, I don't know) the track temperature, so a balmy 65* F might be great for you and me, but if the track is too cold you need to fight to get heat into the tires without crashing; to paraphrase Mat Oxley on twitter, going slow on cold tires causes a crash, but working too hard to get heat into cold tires also causes a crash, so...

 

As you know, I can't even begin to imagine what goes into riding at the level these guys do. Around 8 years ago I overheard Colin Edwards talking to his crew chief at Laguna and they were discussing the fact that when he crested the straightaway the front wheel was lifting 3-4" off the ground and he needed it to be 1-2" max. That was a WTF moment for me and a little insight on the precision that these guys operate with. I also recall in an interview Spies said a great analogy, something to the effect that in AMA you would see guys lines vary by 6' on any given lap, in WSBK that was maybe 2', but in MotoGP these guys are within 6" of the same spot every lap unless they are planning an overtake. Boggles the mind... I raced like I golfed - I got my money's worth and used THE ENTIRE track/course! LOL...