Maverick Viñales (Monster Energy Yamaha) was not only the strongest Yamaha rider, but also the man on the first GP weekend who had apparently arranged his race perfectly and best of all.

Viñales wins ahead of Zarco on the best Ducati

While almost everyone only spoke of Miller and Bagnaia before the season opener in Losail, we warned not to underestimate their French Ducati brand colleagues and the Yamahas. Last on the day before the race, see on this page in the report “Conclusion day 2 Losail GP 1”. In the end, I should be absolutely right. After an initial four-fold lead by Ducati from the first corner, the highly traded Jack Miller promptly fell further and further behind. After just a few laps, Johann Zarco proved to be stronger and the Frenchman passed the Australian on the customer Ducati from Pramac Racing and set off in pursuit of the leading Bagnaia. It was Maverick Viñales in the second half of the race who began to dominate the action . As he later stated, the Catalan tried not to be nervous and to control the race. In particular, it was also about making budget with your tires and this paid off in the end. For the detailed course of the race, see our report “Losail blog – the first race”. When all the races are so exciting, the fans can look forward to a lot of variety. The first four were within 1.222 seconds and Alex Rins in P6 was also less than three and a half seconds behind the winner.

Johann Zarco (Pramac Ducati) – with all the euphoria surrounding Miller and Bagnaia, we had warned not to underestimate the French. The last time on Friday evening and on Sunday he was the best Ducati rider in the race, beating them both and taking a sensational second place.

The most important voices after the race

Race winner Maverick Viñales: „I was happy to fight my way back. Most importantly, the Yamaha is back. We still have to work at the start, but our old strengths are back. Corner speed has always been one of our most important assets and we have that in hand again. I also had a very good feeling for the front. It currently looks like we’re really strong in the race again. Cal (Crutchlow) has a similar riding style to me and helped a lot in developing the bike. The cornering speed was terrific, but of course we definitely have to improve the start. When asked who will be strong throughout the season and win the title in the end, we don’t even think about it.“

Maverick Viñales practiced starts without end and in the end he was only on P6 after a few corners – the winner wants to work on that with Yamaha after even Jorge Martin on the Pramac Ducati had passed his compatriot from 14th on the grid before Turn 1.

Johann Zarco – best Ducati rider after P2: „Yes, this was a wonderful Sunday and a lot went as we had hoped. From the start it was very good and to win 3 positions was of course ideal. I tried to follow Bagnaia and later Vinales, but my tires were already exhausted. After I had overtaken him shortly before the last corner, I was able to catch myself on the straight thanks to my powerful engine. In the last corner I didn’t really know who was where and I went a little far. Luckily I was able to keep Pecco behind. We feel we have a good package and we have to try to get the best every weekend. In the last 6 laps I need a little more reserve to be able to force like Maverick, and I definitely didn’t lack power.” (the last part of the sentence with a big grin on his face after his top speed world record on Saturday).

Johann Zarco (Pramac Ducati) – the desert fox and speed king of Qatar beat both Ducati factory riders at the season opener and did everything right. Many had apparently already forgotten how strong he was at Losail in his very first race as a rookie. Starting position 4 and leading the race for 6 laps before he was eliminated by a fall.

Francesco “Pecco” Bagnaia after P3: „After a difficult season with many setbacks, it was important this year to get off to a good start. I succeeded in doing this and I am happy that it worked. Now we have another race here and we have to analyze the data in order to improve for the second weekend. I’m sure we can improve for the second half of the race in the next race. I didn’t expect to have the rear grip problems that I experienced on race Sunday. But the conditions had changed from the days before. But the bottom line is that I have a podium and we have to be satisfied with that. In the last corner of the race everything went perfectly and I was able to follow Johann (Zarco) to catch up with Joan (Mir) before the finish. After leading for a long time at the beginning, it was of course important for me to make it onto the podium after all.“

Francesco “Pecco” Bagnaia (Ducati Lenovo) – initially like the sure winner in the lead, he was overtaken one after the other by Viñales, Zarco and Mir in the final phase of the race and, thanks to the help of his brand colleague from France, in the end was a wafer-thin third ahead of the reigning world champion on the Suzuki.

The losers – above all KTM with only 2 out of 4 drivers in the points

After the full-bodied slogans last year, the oranges were noticeably quieter. Without Pol Espargaró and their test advantage last year, the Austrians landed brutally on the ground again. Already in the second corner was Danilo Petrucci, the man on the ground who had said in advance that his goal was to be the best KTM rider. You are currently trying to shine with love with silly sayings. For example, their motorsport boss Pit Beirer, when he ironically remarked that he did not have a driver in the top 3 interview. But at the same time he seriously claimed before the race that her bright spot was the racing speed. We had to think about that during the race, when Miguel Oliveira was the only one of the oranges to initially drop out of the top ten and then drop out of the top ten during the race. In the end, even rookie Enea Bastianini embarrassed the entire KTM squad with a sensational tenth place, while Oliveira and Binder were the only riders to collect a meager 5 points for the Austrians.

Fabio Quartararo (Monster Energy Yamaha) in front of the KTM riders Oliveira and Petrucci – the French also stumbled slightly in the race after being in P3 in between, but in contrast to the oranges he did not fall and made a solid start to the season with 5th place. Even before the race, we feared that he had chosen the wrong front tire and we might not have been that wrong.

Yamaha – despite a lot of light also surprisingly strong shadows

The crash of Vice World Champion Franco Morbidelli came as a surprise. While Pramac Ducati rookie Jorge Martin shot from 14th on the grid to P4 before the first corner, Morbido was far behind. Starting the race from position 7, the Italian only returned from the first lap in sixteenth. A little later he even fell back to the penultimate position, on which he stayed until the finish. His Petronas Yamaha SRT team-mate Valentino Rossi, on the other hand, looked strong at the beginning. The old master had lost 3 positions after the start, but initially it looked like he could stay with the top group. But after that he fell further and further back in the course of the race and was only poorly rewarded for his commitment with rank 12, just behind Honda test and reserve driver Bradl. With starting position 4 to get only four points for yourself and the successful Malaysian Yamaha private team, it was simply disappointing. Since Spielberg 2 last year, the worst result for the second best MotoGP team in 2020 behind Suzuki Ecstar.

Valentino Rossi (on the right in the picture) with last year’s team-mate Maverick Viñales (Monster Energy Yamaha) in his arms and next to him his new team-mate Fabio Quartararo. While the works team is in first place in the team classification after round 1, the troops with Morbido and Rossi are in third from last intermediate place.

Suzuki and the long straight – Joan Mir and Alex Rins barely disenchanted

Up to the seventh last lap, a lot looked as if Alex Rins’ forward thrust could not be stopped. After the first lap, the MotoGP “Inspector Gadget” was on position 4, only lying on P9. But in the final, the likeable Suzuki driver couldn’t improve any more. His team mate Joan Mir was a tad faster in the final phase of the race and turned into the last corner while lying on P2. Shortly before that, he had overtaken Johann Zarco, but he did not get the last and 16th corners optimally. Then not only the Frenchman, but also Pecco Bagnaia in his slipstream pulled past him on the long straight before the finish line. As fourth, the reigning world champion just missed the podium by the blink of an eye and Rins was a good sixth behind Quartararo. Not a tailor-made start for the best team from last year, but their tracks will definitely come this season. Losail does not seem to be a preferred territory for the Suzuki.

Joan Mir (Suzuki Ecstar) – Turned onto the home straight second and saw the checkered flag in fourth place, the reigning world champion couldn’t blame himself for not having tried everything. But like with teammate Alex Rins, it didn’t quite work out in the end.

Aprilia – successful (almost) one-man show thanks to Aleix

For the older of the two “asparagus brothers” it was definitely not easy, despite rank 7, to be completely satisfied after the race. During the race we had emphasized in our live blog just a few laps before the end that even the podium would still be possible for Aleix Espargaró (thanks at this point to “RaceBuster” for your input during the race, we incorporated it immediately) . His team-mate Lorenzo Savadori was the last of the classified drivers and was just over 46 seconds behind. Nevertheless, thanks to Aleix Aprilia landed ahead of Honda and KTM with 4 riders each, Chapeau!

Aleix Espargaó in front of teammate Lorenzo Savadori (both Aprilia) – single-handedly, the financially strong Honda and KTM teams were terribly embarrassed. Even if the Catalan sun boy would have preferred to be on the podium, his performance was simply sensational.

Honda – thanks to Pol Espargaró and Bradl, just missed the catastrophe

HRC test and reserve driver Stefan Bradl is likely to have cursed vigorously in between or under his helmet. After Bayer missed the chance to make it into Q2 in FP2, nothing went well in the first qualifying either. Therefore, the Marquez long-term replacement had to start the race from 17th place on the grid, which cost him all chances of a top ten classification. Thanks to many failures and problems from other opponents, it was still 11th place, just ahead of Valentino Rossi. This brings us to two Honda riders who left the race early. In the turbulent start phase, Takaaki Nakagami and Alex Marquez fell behind their brand colleagues, although they started ahead of the German. both of them exaggerated in their race to catch up and paid for their daring with a crash. Pol Espargaró was able to prevent this successfully and in the end, as hoped, he saved the honor of Honda with the only top ten result of their 4 drivers. Ironically, against his older brother Aleix, 56 thousandths were missing from 7th place, making it P8. Unpleasant for Honda and even more so for KTM to have even been beaten by a concession team. After all, in the case of Pol, only very thin.

Pol Espargaró (Repsol Honda) – I’m sure not yet satisfied with his position, but he saved the honor of the world’s largest manufacturer at the start of the season and got stuck. With Alex Marquez, his predecessor in the Honda factory team was just as unsuccessful as Takaaki Nakagami, who was one of the most consistent drivers of all last year.

The ranking list and at the same time World Championship classification

Intermediate result of the team standings after the first race

1MONSTER ENERGY YAMAHA MOTOGP36
2DUCATI LENOVO TEAM23
3TEAM SUZUKI ECSTAR23
4PRAMAC RACING21
5REPSOL HONDA TEAM13
6APRILIA RACING TEAM GRESINI9
7ESPONSORAMA RACING6
8RED BULL KTM FACTORY RACING5
9PETRONAS YAMAHA SRT4
10LCR Honda0
11Tech 3 KTM0

Manufacturers’ championship: Yamaha on Top and KTM with the red lantern

1YAMAHA25
2DUCATI20
3SUZUKI13
4APRILIA9
5HONDA8
6KTM3