CN III CARRUTHERS SAYS...
P134
BY PAUL CARRUTHERS
Marc Marquez tried
a few times to pass
Jorge Lorenzo on
the entrance to
Dry Sack. His pass
finally came in the
last corner.
THE PASS
I
'd be willing to bet that by the
time Jorge Lorenzo closed
his eyes on Sunday night after a very disappointing Spanish
Grand Prix, he was more mad at
himself than he was at Marc Marquez. If he awoke still angered,
then he needs to watch the video
of the last corner again and again
until he calms down… the door
he left open – ironically on the
entrance to the newly named Lorenzo Corner - was a hell of a lot
wider than ajar and the youngster
didn't hesitate to push his way
through the opening. And nor
should he have.
The mistake was Lorenzo's. All Marquez did was take advantage of it.
And, let's not forget, it was the last
lap. Look up last lap in the dictionary and it should read, "all bets are
off." If Marquez had busted up the
inside and rammed Lorenzo like that
on lap four, eight or 12, he would
have deserved a punch in the nose.
On the last lap… well, all bets are
off. He earned himself second place
and the extra points that come with
it. And those points might just mean
the difference between winning the
World Championship or not winning the World Championship when
they're all added up for good on November 10 in Valencia.
But don't take this as me thinking
that Marquez is going to be World
Champion this year because I don't
– though my conviction wavers a bit
more every race when I watch this
kid battle. My money still sits with
Lorenzo because as much as I be-
lieve that the two-time World Champion had calmed himself after the
Marquez incident, I also believe that
his focus quickly changed to what's
really important: Getting the Yamaha
to work a bit better so he's not in that
position next time. I'm sure that was
his focus on Monday morning at the
one-day test at Jerez as he turned his
attention to Le Mans in two weeks
time and not on what happened the
day before.
While many were in an uproar over
Marquez's last-corner pass on Lorenzo, it was the passing attempts
earlier in the race that should scare
the Marquez naysayers more. I'd
much rather be rammed in a slow
corner, the final corner, on the last
lap when expecting it than taken
out in a high-speed corner like Dry
Sack. And that's almost what happened on two separate occasions
