Marc Marquez “lost the front without warning” | Towing? “Superpole is boring”

A crash in Saturday’s Silverstone Sprint race cost Marc Marquez third place in the MotoGP world championship standings to race winner Enea Bastianini.

After inheriting fourth place when reigning champion Francesco Bagnaia crashed out, Marquez suffered the same fate a few laps later.

Having lost touch with the leaders, the Gresini Ducati rider struggled with a lack of temperature in the hard front tyre then fell at the final chicane with three laps to go.

• 2024 British MotoGP, Silverstone - Sprint Race Results

“I was super happy about my race because my target was to try to be in fifth position. Not counting the crash of Bagnaia, I was there,” Marquez said.

“I felt better and better with the bike. But it was a combination of things. We put the hard front tyre and it was very on the limit on the left side. I started to lose the front group, so the front tyre temperature started to drop and on that left corner it was more critical.

“When you put the hard tyre it means that maybe the grip is OK, but the warning is less because it's not moving. I touched a little bit the white line, tried to come back and without warning, I lost the front.

“But it's like this. We are riding super fast. They are riding super fast. And as we see in every race, somebody makes a mistake.”

Bagnaia’s error means Marquez remains 56-points from the top, but dismissed any talk of being in realistic title contention.

“Of course we have a chance, but I already said in Assen: we are not in a position to fight for the championship. From Le Mans we are saving the Sundays at the last minute. So in the end you can save one, two or three [Sundays] but there will be one that we will not save, another that you will do a mistake.

“In the end there are three riders [Bagnaia, Martin and Bastianini] that are constantly are faster than us. Especially now Bastianini is coming very strong. So we cannot do anything. We just try to survive and try not to lose a lot of points and be in the top positions in the end of the championship.”

Towing? “Superpole is boring”

Earlier on Saturday, qualifying had been marred by a big group of riders moving slowly on track in search of a tow.

Marquez had been one of them, but it ultimately backfired when he was held up behind Marco Bezzecchi.

“I will be lucky or happy if I'm the guy that they follow, because it means I'm the fastest one,” Marquez said. “Racing was, is and always will be like this if they don't change the qualifying practice and put like a Superpole.

“But as we see in the past, Superpole is boring. I don't have anything against it, but in Superbikes, it was like one by one and the show wasn't there.

“In the end when you follow somebody, you gain some things. As we see today, everybody at the end of Q2 was waiting for the fastest guy and it’s like this.”

Asked whether imposing automatic penalties for slow sectors should be used in the premier-class, Marquez responded:

“But then the strategy will be in the pitlane. Like in Moto3 right now.

“As I said yesterday, this GP is the first one [this year] that I'm looking for a slipstream. I would like to not do it, like I did in past races. But of course, the rules are the rules and I'm not the guy to decide.”

But improving your lap time behind another rider is not guaranteed:

“Today Bezzecchi went out at Turn 3 and was in the middle of di Giannantonio and me. And yeah, he did his fastest lap on that lap but [only] 59.6. [So] he slowed me down. But it was no penalty and I agree.

“But in the end, if you are not disturbing the others, it's OK.”