Jorge Martin (2nd): Victory at Silverstone was already out of reach after Turn 1

World Championship leader Jorge Martin leaves the Silverstone weekend on a high. In qualifying, the Aprilia rider broke the lap record and secured pole position; shortly afterwards, he claimed victory in the Sprint race as part of an Aprilia one-two-three finish ahead of Ai Ogura and Marco Bezzecchi. This gave him the best starting position for Sunday’s 20-lap race.

Sparks flying at Abbey, a comeback with no chance of victory

But his chances of victory in the race were already gone by Turn 1. Martin’s rear ride-height device remained activated in Turn 1; sparks flew from beneath the bike and the pole-sitter was forced wide at Abbey and overtaken. “I made a small mistake at the start. The device was activated, which is why all the riders overtook me,” he explained later in the parc fermé. “I managed to fight my way back, but that’s where I lost the win.” Ai Ogura suffered the same problem: the Japanese rider dropped back to 7th place and later crashed.

Whilst Raul Fernandez pulled away at the front, Martin fought his way back: first past Marc Marquez, then past his team-mate Bezzecchi. At times, he was the only rider on the track clocking 1:58 laps, but the gap had grown to over four seconds. In the closing stages, he pushed the pace once more and took half a second off the leader’s lap time, but it was too late for a final attack. “I rode at my own pace towards the end and hoped that Raul would ease off a bit. He rode impressively,” analysed Martin, congratulating Aprilia on a successful weekend in which only riders on an RS-GP stood on the podium in both the Sprint and the Grand Prix.

Jorge Martin extends his World Championship lead and gains confidence

Before the weekend, Martin had said he didn’t feel like a championship leader. That has changed: “I’m happy for the team and for myself. This gives us a huge boost of confidence heading into the end of the season. It seems as though we’ve found the direction we need to take at the moment.”

In the overall standings, Martin remains on 240 points. His lead has grown from 17 to 31 points – now over Marco Bezzecchi, who took over second place in the championship from Ai Ogura thanks to a hard-fought third-place finish at Silverstone. The race victory went to Raúl Fernández, who has thus continued the Silverstone streak: he is the twelfth different winner across twelve MotoGP events in central England.

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