During the Sprint race of the MotoGP Catalan Grand Prix, Franco Morbidelli (Prima Pramac/Ducati) was penalized with a Long Lap due to an attempted overtake on Álex Márquez (Gresini/Ducati), during which he forced Márquez to widen his trajectory and go off track.
The Spanish rider was succinct in his explanation of the incident: ‘He just went in to turn 4 straight, he touched me and I went to the gravel, so nothing more’.
Márquez finds the different judgments by the stewards regarding Morbidelli’s maneuver perplexing, especially since similar moves went unpenalized during the French GP two weeks ago:
– Here he took the Long Lap penalty, not in Le Mans. So it’s really strange, because he did exactly the same in Le Mans to me, to Aleix [Espargaró], to [Fabio] DiGia, and to [Johann] Zarco. So, it’s a different way of stewards to understand the things, but in the end with Long Lap or without it, it doesn’t change anything for me.