Jorge Martin prevails in the Sprint with a dominant performance
Phil Branagan
Saturday, 19 October 2024
Martin won the start and streaked away from the high-quality field.
Jorge Martin has extended his MotoGP™ points lead with a dominant win in the Qatar Airways Australian Motorcycle Grand Prix 2024 Tissot Sprint.
For the second MotoGP™ Saturday in a row, Martin won the start and streaked away from the high-quality field – but this time, with a race distance of only 13 laps, his rear tyre survived the pace, and he motored home to a 1.52s victory.
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“I thought it was going to be much more difficult there with Marc so close behind me,” he said after extending his title lead to 16 points.
“When I see I had a big gap already, I was so happy.”
No one in the field had an answer to the speed of the Pramac Ducati GP24, but Marc Marquez was the man to chase him the hardest. He made a solid start but ran wide on the first corner and dropped to eighth place. But from that point on, the eight-time world champion went into qualifying mode, surging forward and picking off bikes seemingly at will to take second place on the Gresini Racing Ducati GP23.
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“The speed is there, without a mistake at the first corner, let’s see if tomorrow I can play with him,” Marquez said.
The Ducati Corse works bikes took third and fourth place but, probably, not in the order that Pecco Bagnaia would have preferred. The world champion ran second early before Marquez steamed past, soon to be followed by Enea Bastianini.
Fabio Di Giannantonio took fifth place for VR46 Ducati ahead of Martin’s teammate Franco Morbidelli, but there were no top-six results for Marco Bezzecchi and Maverick Viñales. The Spaniard swept past the Italian at the first corner but the yellow Ducati got caught in the draft of the factory Aprilia at a speed estimated at 250km/h, the two bikes clattering into the run-off area.
It was a miserable day for anyone on a KTM. Jack Miller made a good start but quickly dropped places, running in 10th place before he dropped his Red Bull KTM on lap 8, quickly getting to his feet, unhurt.
Pedro Acosta, who started from a career-worst 15th on the grid, also crashed out of the race, on lap 10.
