Pol Espargaro reckons that Johann Zarco “wanted the contact” that caused him to crash out from the Czech grand prix at Brno while battling for fourth.
The KTM racer came under pressure from the Frenchman after making a couple of small errors while trying to push Fabio Quartararo for third, with a final mistake at Turn 1 allowing Zarco close enough to make a move.
The Avintia man drove into the gap Espargaro had left going wide, but was unsighted and got collected as the RC16 closed back in to take the apex.
While Zarco continued, Espargaro went down and slid into the gravel on the exit of the bend, retiring from the contest while team-mate Brad Binder went on to win his and KTM’s first MotoGP race.
Zarco was subsequently handed a long-lap penalty for his part in the incident, but still went on to secure a debut podium for his Avintia outfit in third-leading Espargaro to declare Zarco’s penalty “was not enough.”
“I’m OK. The crash though was just, Zarco didn’t care about me in that moment,” said an angry Espargaro following his retirement.
“He was riding like he wanted the contact, he was looking for it and he just pushed me away and he made me crash.
“Race direction also saw it that way and he got the penalty but as the penalty was not enough he still managed to finish on the podium after crashing out a guy that would have been in front of him so he probably wouldn’t have even been on the podium, so for him it (contact) was the perfect job today.”
Zarco meanwhile disagreed with Espargaro’s assessment of the incident, believing that his penalty was “fair” and that Espargaro simply hadn’t seen him on the inside and that therefore their clash was a racing incident.
“My penalty (for contact with) Pol (Espargaro) was fair with the rules we have, but as I said I tried to come in as there was the space, and I thought I closed in quite well.
“I thought he was going to see me but then we got the contact it seems that he didn’t see me, but in the race you have to try things and we don’t always have a big margin to overtake.
“He was always braking really late and carrying a lot of speed into the corner so it was not easy to overtake him on the brakes.
“But that was also why he went too wide at the first corner, but I was expecting with the rules we have that something would happen (penalty), I was happy nothing happened because they waited many laps to give me the long lap penalty so for me it shouldn’t be more (costly) as this race it was good as I didn’t lose any positions.
“It’s also part of the race, we have to remind that racing is not easy and that we all have a warrior mindset, but I deserved the podium today and I’m sorry for Pol.”
i watched the incident and have been in precisely the same position of BOTH of these guys ( in cars ) and i can say that i would have done the same thing as zarco . i think the penalty was unfounded . you make the mistake like pol and you try to keep the guy from going by like pol did and/or a guy makes a mistake in front of you and you grab that opportunity with both hands. zarco didn’t banzai him . he drove into a legit gap completely under control. he didn’t owe pol anything at that point. … in my opinion anyway…
… and the more it goes, the more people will end not caring about what Pol Espargaro says …. and does
This whining display is sad. I thought he was a grown man. Wait until he gets on the Honda and it starts spitting him off. Who will he blame then?