2024 French MotoGP: Martin sets new lap time and wins Sprint

orge Martin of Pramac Racing smashed the Le Mans circuit lap time record by completing it within 90 seconds. No other rider managed to breach 1-minute 29-second time as Francesco Bagnaia had to settle for second place in the qualifiers while Aprilia’s Maverick Vinales took third. No prizes in guessing, the Jorge Martin show continued as he won his second consecutive Sprint this season with a comfortable over 2.2 seconds lead over Marc Marquez and Vinales continued to have a good outing as he stormed to take the final podium. 

2024 French MotoGP: Record-breaking pole position

The morning qualifying had its thrills, disappointments and a series of crashes. Jorge Martin swatted away the lap record on his first qualifying lap in Q2. Before the fans and the media could come to terms with the Parmac rider smashing the Bugatti circuit record, Martin once again created history by setting a record time of 1 minute 29.919 seconds. The Martinator become the only rider to clock in 1:29 time. Defending champion Bagnaia secured second place and improved his time by clocking 1 minute 30.111 seconds. In the first half of the qualifying, the two Aprilia riders Vinales and Aleix Espargaro showed some serious pace and were third and fourth respectively.

Unfortunately, for many the latter half of Q2 was full of crashes. After securing first and second place, Martin and Bagnaia crashed out and the domino effect continued as Espargaro and KTM’s Jack Miller followed suit. You know what they, it’s one man’s loss is another man’s gain. The VR46 duo, Fabio Di Giannantonio and Marco Bezzecchi made the most of this situation when everyone around them was crashing like ninepins as they finished fourth and fifth respectively. Marc Marquez has had to contend with the 13th position. The six-time world champion could not qualify for Q2 as he had to abort his final flying lap when he lost grip in the front end. 

2024 French MotoGP: Martinator wins Sprint, Bagnaia retires

The Sprint Race gods have more often than not favoured Martin as he won his 12th in his career while Bagnaia initially struggled for pace and then finally had to retire due to technical glitches. Martin had a perfect launch from the word go and was ahead of the pack on all 13 laps. With this win, Martin has a comfortable 28-point cushion ahead of Ducati’s Enea Bastianini. Marc Marquez started 13th on the grid, but that didn’t dampen his enthusiasm as he propelled himself to fourth in the first lap. It looked like the heavens were smiling down on Marquez as Aleix Espargaro, who was third, was penalized for jumping the start.

The Gresini rider moved up to third behind VR46’s Bezzecchi. The Bez had eaten into Martin’s lead, and Marquez was doing the same but unfortunately, the VR46 man crashed out and handed P2 to the Spaniard. With Espargaro serving his second penalty, his teammate had locked into third position. Maverick saw off a late charge by Bastianini as the Ducati rider had to settle for fourth followed Espargaro while the rookie Pedro Acosta finished sixth. Bagnaia had a terrible start as he slipped from second to 14th. While trying to catch up with the leader of the pack, on Lap 3 he went wide on Turn 7 and went into the gravel. After that, he decided to retire from the Sprint race.