David Writes:

Sepang will be remembered as a black day in the history of MotoGP. There was a lot of ugliness all weekend in the clash at Sepang, capped by the behaviour of Valentino Rossi and Marc Márquez during the race, ultimately leading to Rossi causing Márquez to crash. Not that Márquez didn’t deserve it, but for Rossi to take his eyes off the championship and get involved in a personal vendetta from which no winners could emerge was surprisingly foolish. Rossi was edging closer to taking his tenth title, and could have gone to Valencia holding a match ball. But he threw it all away in a moment of madness, born of sheer frustration.

An even less appetizing picture emerges of Marc Márquez. The Spaniard took affront at the accusations Rossi made that he was working to help Lorenzo beat the Italian in the championship, and had held Rossi up at Phillip Island. Whether those accusations had any basis in fact or not – my analysis says they do not, but it is really hard to tell – the fact is that Márquez decided to fight harder against Rossi at Sepang than he had against any other rider, goading Rossi into lashing out, pushing him wide, and eventually causing him to crash.

In the press conference, Jorge Lorenzo added yet another bad taste in the mouth, spending his time complaining that Rossi had not been disqualified. He had a chance to walk away from this looking dignified, and still holding the strongest hand in the championship – Lorenzo is a rocket around Valencia, Rossi has never really got on with the track – but he instead, he managed to make himself look bitter and petty. Lorenzo may have a point when he says that the penalties handed out by Race Direction are inconsistent and can seem arbitrary, but he would have won a lot more fans if he had kept those thoughts to himself.

Which is very much the point. We idolize these riders. I became a Rossi fan watching him race in 125s and 250s, and was blown away by his debut in 500s. The more closely I followed Grand Prix racing, the greater my appreciation for all of the riders involved. Once I started writing about the sport for a living, that feeling grew even stronger. It is not that I stopped being a fan of Valentino Rossi, more that I also became a fan of Nicky Hayden, Casey Stoner, Jorge Lorenzo, Dani Pedrosa and everyone on the grid. As you get to know riders better on a personal level, you start to see the human underneath, and you may have more affinity for one rider than another, but the admiration for all of them remains. From MotoGP champion to last place on the Moto3 grid, every one of these riders is special.

But you also see the ugly side…to read the full blog click HERE

Matthew writes:

As knee-jerk reactions to a knee-jerk incident go they don’t come any more impulsive than the flurry of opinion that followed Sunday’s moment of MotoGP madness in Malaysia. Social media was awash with conjecture from both sides of a Rossi-Marquez fan divide that hadn’t existed before Thursday’s bizarre press conference and even the most experienced paddock insiders struggled to believe what they were seeing, let alone describe it.

“That wasn’t the hand of God, it was the knee of the GOAT!” exclaimed BT Sport’s lead MotoGP commentator Keith Huewen, who rapidly jumped to a series of conclusions with each replay of the incident as he settled on Rossi as the aggressor (the ‘Hand of God’ reference, for non-soccer fans, is to Diego Maradona, who deliberately used his hand to score an illegal goal against England in the 1986 World Cup).

“I’m afraid I’m very sorry, and I am a Valentino Rossi fan through and through, but that was not good riding,” concluded Huewen as Marquez returned to the pits. “That was a personal swipe at the soon to be ex-World Champion.”

Keith’s opinion was echoed by his colleagues Neil Hodgson and James Toseland, who agreed with the notion that Rossi was punishable. All three of those guys have raced Grand Prix motorcycles and therefore automatically have a viewpoint that is 100% more valid than those of us who haven’t. However, I do wonder now that the dust has settled and with the benefit of hindsight, whether they all stand by their initial call.

Looking at the social media streams of other current and ex-professional riders over the past couple of days there certainly seems to have been a growing swell of support for Rossi since Sunday, but whether you wear yellow-tinted glasses or not, it is clear that nobody came away from Sepang with much credit.

Click HERE to read on…