In his intervention on crash.net reviewing the Malaysian Grand Prix, former driver Keith Huewen revealed that, in the community, there was a “ unwritten rule " who is " that a driver must not interfere with another who is playing for the world title ". When the interested party was asked how many times it had been infringed, he replied “ Sepang 2015 with Marc Marquez and Valentino Rossi ". The first mentioned remembers it very well and he also spoke about it in Sepang…
At Sepang in 2022, Marc Marquez spoke about Sepang 2015, in a way that resonated the words of Keith Huewen in the void. The official Honda had then clearly demonstrated that we could disrupt a pilot playing a title for which we were no longer concerned. But there was also a context which did not make the maneuver spontaneous. Marc Marquez refreshes our memory thus: “ I remember Valentino came to the press conference in Sepang with the list of lap times in the Australian race. It didn't make any sense ».
On what followed in the race, he said: “ today I would do the same thing and I would not behave differently. I simply fought in a race, maybe more than normal in the first laps, but so did Rossi. Neither had more speed than the other, but we fought for a few laps until one of them lost his temper. In the end it was he who lost his temper ».
Marc Marquez: “today, I would do the same thing and I would not behave differently than in 2015"
And since then, we have known their relationships. Or at least their lack of relationships, except through boos from fans wearing yellow and 46 towards 93 on the podium MotoGP : " we haven't had any contact since Valentino retired, and I don't want it anymore » comments bluntly Marc Marquez. " The years go by, I want it less and less and I don't care ».
He nevertheless specifies: “ If I had wanted to favor Lorenzo, I would not have passed him at turn ten at Phillip Island. But I repeat, I would have acted the same way and I would have managed the race the same way. Finally, I don't know if this story attracted more people. When there's controversy in a sport, it makes more noise and people get interested and wonder what's going on. I'm not saying it's changed, because I don't know if it ever happened before, but the boos on the podium and the cheers for the accidents are a truth and there was one person who could have stopped them but didn't want to » concludes the eight-time World Champion.
