Historic hat-trick on the Dutch circuit of Assen for the Moto GP World Champion Francesco “Pecco” Bagnaia. With a funny ending after the awards ceremony. What happened in the press room
We are halfway through the 2024 Moto GP season and the values on the track are now defined. The race for the world title will be a tale of two between the reigning World Champion, the Italian Francesco “Pecco” Bagnaia and the Spaniard Jorge Martín Almoguera. The two, after the Assen race, a race that saw Bagnaia hit a sumptuous double, Sprint Race plus Raceare separated by 10 points. 200 points for Martin, 190 points for the Italian driver.
Con Marc Marquez and Enea Bastianini distanced but still in the race. After all, after the race on Sunday 7th July at the Sachsenring there will be the summer break and there will be twelve races left before the return to the game. Twelve races where anything can happen but where the values already defined will only be able to take shape and strength. The same strength that the World Champion put on the track who for the third consecutive year won on the difficult Assen circuit.
Bagnaia scores a hat-trick
Just a legend like Michael Doohan had done the same route winning on the Dutch circuit between 1994 and 1996. The series of the Australian rider, riding the Honda, reaches up to 1998 and was broken in 1999 by the Japanese Tadayuki Okada. A series that Pecco wants to try to at least equal.
But now the goal is another, to win the third world championship in a row and to get closer in the number of world titles to the two sacred monsters of Moto GP. That is Valentino Rossi who has won six titles in a row, and Marc Marquez, stuck at the same figure since 2019.
The World Champion comes out into the open
A proposal that Francesco Bagnaia made clear already at the press conference held in the heart of the Assen Circuit at the end of the pyrotechnic awards ceremony. Bagnaia climbed onto the stage on his motorbike and surrounded by the typical smoke bombs of a rockstar. “I liked everything about this weekend,” Bagnaia explained without compromise or embellishment. “We achieved perfection.”
Three decisive factors in this affirmation. The race pace, the choice of tires and why not a crowd of fans who have supported Bagnaia, and Bastianini, and Ducati, since the tests. At this point there is no longer any hiding. Bagnaia is the favorite for the title and he is aware of it. So aware that he clearly says to himself and to the Team that today they are at the top, they are perfect. And the fans can dream
