Casey Stoner has weighed in on the Valentino Rossi-Marc Marquez spat that has dominated headlines on-and-off in MotoGP since 2015. It’s a feud that still captures the raging imagination of fans from across the MotoGP spectrum even 10 years on, especially as Marquez now prepares to team up with Rossi’s protege, Francesco Bagnaia, at Ducati this year. For Stoner, it’s also one in which Marquez has “deserved” the criticism levelled by some at him. “Marc [Marquez], to a certain degree, deserved his criticism,” Stoner said on the Ducati Diaries podcast. “He tried to get in there.” Stoner affirmed, though, that the blame for the whole spat lay at Rossi’s door – Marquez was simply responding to an attack. “Even though people blame Marc for the whole thing,” Stoner said, “people forget that Valentino [Rossi] started it. “Marc’s Marc, we’ve watched him do that all through his racing, and then Valentino started a war of words. “They were all friends, and all the rest of it, then Valentino started something, and then Marc retaliated because he didn’t like it. “And then of course everybody blows up about that, forgetting that Valentino went and poked the bear.” Stoner explained that the fallout […]
Two-times MotoGP World Champion Casey Stoner has blamed downforce aerodynamics for a huge crash at last weekend’s Australian MotoGP race. The incident in question occurred in Saturday’s MotoGP Sprint, when Maverick Vinales passed Marco Bezzecchi on the run into turn one. Vinales edged towards the outside of the track after passing Bezzecchi to take a better line through the first corner, but Bezzecchi then ran into the back of the Aprilia rider under braking and both riders fell. “This is the result of aero,” Stoner commented on an Instagram post from the official MotoGP account. “The wake caused by them at that speed is too much.” Stoner made his opinions on downforce aerodynamics clear also earlier this year when he appeared on the Ducati Diaries podcast with Neil Hodgson. The two-times MotoGP World Champion explained that the aerodynamics, in combination with ride height devices and electronics, work to reduce the quality of racing in MotoGP by increasing grip and therefore reducing the chance for riders to make mistakes. Bezzecchi was awarded a long lap penalty for his role in the incident. One lap after serving it in Sunday’s Grand Prix at turn four, Bezzecchi crashed at the same corner before […]
