Maverick Viñales in the Monster Energy Box – a picture that has never been seen since Spielberg 2. As already suspected after its suspension for the Austrian GP, Yamaha no longer wanted to continue with the bad boy.

Official separation of Yamaha and Maverick Viñales

It was a situation that presented early this season as unsolvable for both parties. The Spaniard had even got a new crew chief after having reported problems several times after the opening win in Losail. But at the latest at the Sachsenring it became clear that the brand with the crossed tuning forks in the logo no longer had a future. The capricious Catalan had publicly criticized his team and even accused them of a lack of respect. Then came the scandal in Austria. At the first race in Austria, Viñales’ machine had run out of engine on the warm-up lap to restart. Therefore, the 26-year-old had to tackle the race from the pit lane. Then he ignored the permanently flashing pit lane signal on the display of his Yamaha M1 and only entered the pit shortly before the end of the race.

A picture from happier days, taken by us before the start of the 2019 season in Losail (Qatar). The polesitter suffered a setback in the race, but he was one of the few drivers that Marc Marquez was able to beat in a direct duel in his last dominant season.

Evidence found for wanton attempts to destroy his engine
Afterwards, Maverick asserted that he believed there was an incorrect ad, but this soon proved to be a cheap excuse. As it turned out, the multiple gas bumps when driving into the box were not the main reason for his team’s decision to be responsible for his suspension in Spielberg. Rather, as we already explained on the second Spielberg weekend, the team discovered that the man from Figueres acted with deliberately destructive intent. He must be very stupid if he believed during his mindless action that the Japanese technicians would not find out from the telemetry data. In his frustration, he must have deliberately tried to deliberately destroy the engine of his M1 while driving. This is primarily done by downshifting into too low a gear and thus over-revving the engine.

Yamaha test rider Cal Crutchlow has already been nominated as substitute rider for Frankie Morbidelli for Spielberg, and now he drives his home Grand Prix instead of Maverick for the Monster Energy Yamaha team, while Jake Dixon will drive the Morbido Petronas Yamaha.

His destructive behavior, which was impossible to tolerate, meant the end
Anyone who knows the soul of a man of honour from Nippon immediately realized that no one in charge at Yamaha would let the Spaniard get away with this after his previous insults. It was agreed with Maverick on the official formulation that this was done by mutual agreement. But as with the announcement of the separation at the end of the season, this was nothing but a false and worthless phrase. Today, unfortunately, too often lies and glosses over when it comes to such topics, because in fact it was an expulsion. And actually, it has also been clarified whether Viñales was already released by earlier. In plain language, whether he will be sitting on the Aprilia this year and possibly even compete against Yamaha. The likelihood of this has so far been assessed as low, because otherwise he could take away points from his former colleagues. After all, Yamaha is fighting for the drivers ‘and manufacturers’ championships. But the wording of Yamaha race director Lin Jarvis leaves no room for doubt and the Catalan is released with immediate effect, which means that he can in principle be used for the Italians from now on.

Maverick in Jerez 2020 with the expression on his face that suits his current situation – he was already the bad boy of Moto3 in 2012 and now he has also made this title eight years later in the premier class.

The different scenarios for the rest of the 2021 races

The line-up for Silverstone is already clear, while Yamaha now has to consider how to proceed with the following rounds. On the one hand, Morbidelli can switch to the works team early after his return and Crutchlow can replace the injured Italian in the B-Team Petronas SRT. On the other hand, it is also conceivable that the English driver would drive the factory Yamaha instead of Maverick until the end of the season. The first option seems much more plausible, although everything could turn out differently. If, for example, Jake Dixon immediately impresses with Morbido’s so-called A-Spec bike, the Brit could be used in MotoGP early.

Jake Dixon in Le Mans – the Englishman is apparently the crown favourite for the MotoGP commitment at Yamaha.

The question of guilt does not arise
It’s a shame it ended up like this, but the Japanese company is not to blame. On the contrary, they are the ones to suffer and will probably have to improvise for the rest of the year. The question of who is responsible for the disaster that has arisen does not arise. Except for the works team with Quartararo and Frankie Morbidelli, the future at Yamaha for 2022 is still completely open. Petronas’ withdrawal as the main sponsor of the customer team is also partly to blame for this. Without a sufficient budget, there is a risk of withdrawing from Moto2 and Moto3 and, above all, of the sporting descent into the insignificance of the premier class.

The still provisional combined calendar of MotoGP and WorldSBK

The MotoGP events that collide with the near-series World Cup are shown in red.

Unless otherwise stated, this applies to all images (© MotoGP).