Season starts tonight with the Thailand sprint race. Bez is looking pretty strong, I'm interested in how Toprak will do on the Yamaha.

Woo Hoo winter is nearly over! I Alex Marquez to take the next step this year. Bez does look awesome right now.

I’m working my way through all of it. Press conference, each practice, in Q1 right now. Q2 and the Sprint later tonight.

Bez looks on it. The new Ape has these new ducts they keep making a big deal out of. It’s going to take more than vents to beat Ducati over a season. But I’m hoping he can finally be the one to take it to Ducati and Marquez. Rooting for him, and all the Italians.

Toprak isn’t going to do anything on that Yamaha. They took too long to convert to a V4 and they are massively behind. Toprak has been in the rear with the gear all during testing in Sepang and Buriam before the season started. And I mean last or next to last.

Aprilia looks to have narrowed the gap to the Ducati over the winter. Honda keeps looking better and we saw that last year. KTM would be next and Yamaha is in the shitter.

Well if Bez wouldn’t have crashed out in the Sprint it would have been a total Bez/Aprilia domination weekend. Fastest in each practice session. Pole position. Race win, but the Sprint crash was the one caveat. We’ll have to get to Europe to see if the Aprilia improvements have leveled it up against Ducati. This was 88 races in a row of Ducati being on the podium and that now has come to an end. The sport needs more disparity and looks like we are getting it.

Acosta was the rider of the weekend despite Bez’s dominance. Pedro won the Sprint due to Bez’s crash, and bagged 2nd in the race. He now bags his first KTM win via the Sprint, and he leads the championship. He is overriding the KTM and when he joins Marquez next year at Factory Ducati, Marc is going to have his hands full as Acosta is the most talented rider in the field, including Marquez. Looks like KTM have solved their tire management over the winter. Last year, Acosta would have fallen back 1/2 race distance with the rear tire, absolutely shot.

And Marc caused his own issue during the race. He went wide, smacked the rear rim into the curb, bent it severely and caused the tire to grenade due to the bent rim. Pedro put so many passes on him in the Sprint and Race. That’s a warning shot to Marquez too, that he isn’t scared of him, and will take it to him, 24/7. Marc is still recovering from shoulder surgery. He now gets 3 weeks before Brazil, to heal up some more.

Raul Fernandez bagged third in the Sprint and Race. He is maturing, like Pedro and Marco, and it shows Aprilia have made some big steps over the winter.

It’s looking like this will be Aprilia vs. Ducati showdown. With Pedro being the lone KTM in the podium places. Honda will hold 4th/5th, and Yamaha will be dead last. Just like every season, we’ll know what’s what once we get back to Europe and get 3 races under the belt. By the time they get 3 or so races done in Europe we’ll know who is going to be there to compete for the championship. That won’t happen until the end of May once Mugello is completed. The first 4 races are fly seats. Thailand, Brazil, USA, and Qatar.

Saw on another forum that SPEED is re-running the full race on YT

https://youtu.be/XfY78SWrJjE

If they do this for every race, I'll be tuning in.