until Abu Dhabi Autonomous Racing League
When Alex Rins crossed the line first in Sunday’s Australian Grand Prix to take Suzuki’s first win since the end of the 2020 MotoGP season, it came as something of an unexpected bonus for both rider and team in their antepenultimate race together, with the Japanese manufacturer set to fold its factory effort in only a few weeks’ time at the season finance in Valencia.
Never quite looking so fast throughout the weekend despite some whisperings from The Race’s sources in the box about impressive race pace that was never quite highlighted in practice, it’s fair to say that Rins’ success came as something of a shock to nearly everyone.
Yet, according to one of his podium battle rivals, it might well be that the combination of the Suzuki GSX-RR’s always-impressive speed on the fast-cornering Phillip Island circuit and the fact that the team could take a risk on Sunday combined to deliver a rather exceptional result that at least means Suzuki will finish its final season on a relative high.
The final charge for victory ultimately came from Rins’ tactics more than anything else, as the Spaniard set up his win in style against Marc Marquez and Pecco Bagnaia.
“I tried to open the front, to make a small gap, but to also take care of the spin of the rear tyre,” he said afterwards. “But immediately they overtook me again on the straights so I decided to stay behind and to arrive at the end of the race with a little bit more.
“I knew that if I started the last lap in second position, I had some chance to overtake Pecco between corner one and corner two. I did it like this, and I finished in the first position.”
However, while Rins might have benefitted from careful management of the rubber, VR46 Ducati rider Luca Marini instead insisted that he believed Rins and Suzuki made a carefully chosen gamble before the race even started that paid off for them.
With MotoGP racing a new-construction Michelin rear tyre that was designed specifically for Phillip Island, one of the most demanding circuits of the whole year in terms of tyre life, Marini said that the advice from the French firm was to take a conservative approach – something that most factories heeded when it came to selection the traction control settings to load into their machines’ electronic brains.
“Everyone was worried about the wear of the rear tyre,” Marini explained. “The traction was working too much and we didn’t have enough maps for less traction and to use more of the rear tyre, like Rins did.
“The acceleration of Rins was impressive. On the electronics side, everyone else was very safe, because Michelin never used this casing in this track and never used this compound. They were worried, and they gave advice to us to stay safe.
“It’s OK, we stayed safe, but the guys who risked a little bit more at the end stayed in the front.”
Double podium chance goes begging
Unfortunately for the other side of the Suzuki garage, however, one of the most bizarre technical problems of recent years meant that Rins’ team-mate Joan Mir’s race was essentially neutralised before the bike even left the garage.
Looking strong early in the race but then very quickly dropping through the field to eventually finish well outside the points in a distant 18th place, he was almost incredulous afterwards as he explained to the media how a broken tyre pressure gauge had destroyed his race.
“When I came into the box, I complained about the tyres, that something wasn’t right,” he said.
“The team put the data on and understood that I was completely out of the pressure with the tyres. Both – more the rear, a lot more the rear, but both. Then we realised it was a problem with the pressure controller.
“It’s a shame what happened because it completely ruined my race. In one moment of the race, I figured our bike could win, after a good start.”
