Marc Marquez spent most of the Qatar MotoGP near Brad Binder’s KTM, but admits ‘it’s the bike I understand the least.’ He predicts race winner Enea Bastianini and Repsol Honda rider Pol Espargaro will challenge for the 2022 championship.
The Qatar MotoGP wasn’t really short on shocks, but Brad Binder’s second-place finish for KTM was likely just as surprising – if not more so – as Enea Bastianini’s inaugural win for Gresini Ducati.
While Bastianini was a force to be reckoned with during testing, and the GP21 won seven races previous season, KTM’s winter results were the least remarkable of any manufacturer on paper.
During five days in Sepang and Mandalika, the RC16 only made one top eight appearance, as the Austrian manufacturer regrouped from a hit-or-miss 2021.
With Binder and KTM having never performed better than eighth at Lusail, few would have anticipated the South African would close just 0.346s behind the winner.
Marc Marquez, the eight-time world champion, maintained a careful eye on the orange machine’s performance until the South African made a late charge with six circuits remaining.
“It’s the bike I understand the least,” Marquez said of Binder’s KTM. “I understand Bastianini, the way that he rides. But Binder was like… each lap was different.
“I mean one lap he was going in [to the corners] very fast, another lap he was going in slower but exiting very fast.
“So still KTM, particularly behind Binder, I didn’t understand. But they have a good engine, he was stopping the bike a lot with the rear tyre also, and he was very fast at the end of the race.”
Marquez finished fifth, 4.099s behind Bastianini and 2.7s ahead of Repsol Honda rider Pol Espargaro, who dominated for the majority of the race before finally finishing third.
While the KTM is still a mystery, and the first race is “always exceptional,” Marquez has seen enough to anticipate Bastianini and Espargaro will be title challengers.
“The first race is always special and particularly here in Qatar,” Marquez said. “It’s a race track where we always see at some different results.
“Last year here Maverick and Quartararo were very fast [12th and 9th on Sunday], Zarco was very fast and then in the season he was not fast enough.
“But I believe that I saw two guys today, which was Bastianini and Pol Espargaro, they were fast and they will be contenders for the championship.”
The second round will be held in Mandalika next weekend, where Espargaro set the quickest time in pre-season testing.
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Marc Marquez, KTM, Red Bull, Andrea Dovizioso, Fabio Quartararo, Enea Bastianini, MOTO, Moto racing, Motocross, MOTOGP, MXGP
