Jorge Martin put on quite a show in the Austin Sprint… perhaps a bit too much, one might say. He won Saturday’s short race by being the only rider to opt for a medium-compound rear tire and overtaking Bagnaia just a few corners before the checkered flag. As soon as he crossed the finish line, he celebrated like in the good old days: smashing the fairing of his Aprilia with a fist.
Usually he limited himself to the plexiglass, but yesterday the Spaniard got a little carried away. On the straight opposite the finish line—the longest on the circuit—he attempted a wheelie that ended in a tumble.“How fast was I going? I was in fourth gear; I must have been going 200 km/h,” he explained. Too bad that when he put the front wheel down, it locked up and Jorge found himself sliding across the asphalt.
All’s well that ends well: Martin got away without a scratch. His RS-GP, on the other hand, came out of it a bit dented:“I apologize to the team for the extra work.”