Carmelo Ezpeleta wanted to avoid that at all costs and he had seen the blow coming against Freddie Spencer's team in charge of discipline in the peloton from the Catalan Grand Prix. But the Barcelona “Nakagamigate”, following which the boss of Dorna made it clear that he intended for the panel of FIM commissioners to be respected, was followed by the Quartararo affair at Assen. The dam put in place by Ezpeleta to contain the flow of criticism has given way in the Netherlands, and in particular under pressure from people who weigh in on the paddock. It was from Yamaha that came a frontal and brutal attack against the authority of the referees, and in particular from an on-field boss Lin Jarvis who thus created a real precedent. Which we will now have to assume.
The panel of FIM commissioners whose symbol is Freddie spencer had attracted the wrath of MotoGP riders by evaluating the action of Taka Nakagami like a racing event in Catalonia. The same provoked anger in high places at Yamaha by sanctioning fabio quartararo after his failed overtaking maneuver on Aleix Espargaró. The Frenchman will have to go through a long time, during the return race at Silverstone, after five weeks of summer break and while the Aprilia official was able to resume competition in Holland and regain 14 points in the championship from the Frenchman, who abandoned after a second fall…
Clearly, given the situation, fabio quartararo thus seems doubly punished. And the legitimacy of its sanction, already seriously undermined, will seem all the less obvious as it will have to be accomplished after a long delay imposed by the calendar, and at the opening of the last part of the season, a moment when everything the world would have liked to forget this affair to start again on a good basis.
What remains is this field of ruin left after the battle of Assen that feared Carmelo Ezpeleta. He can impose silence on the pilots but he has been overwhelmed by people who have high positions like him and who therefore have the vocation to stay above the fray. To understand the impact of this charge of Lynn Jarvis, it is necessary to refer to the analysis seen on crash.net made by the former Grand Prix driver and British champion Keith Huewen.
« Freddie Spencer's position has become untenable«
On this aspect of the subject, he says: “ Freddie Spencer's position has become untenable now. And If I were Freddie Spencer, I would quit, just on principle, since I no longer seem to have the confidence of the drivers or the teams ». Huewen adds: " once the big guns come out like Lin Jarvis and start throwing big grenades at you, you're screwed, really ". And he ends: “ let me add one more thing: no one wants this job. When they got Freddie Spencer, I knew who the contestants were beforehand and no one wanted to do it. Nobody wants to do it yet ».
And it is not with what is happening that vocations will be born… “ We are dealing with intelligent people of great power. And here, we have a public bashing session, blaming the scapegoat that is Freddie Spencer » insists the Briton who regrets this turn of events: “ why do we have to wash our laundry in public anyway? If they are unhappy with the way the FIM Stewards operate, why aren't they handling this behind the scenes in the right way? ».
This is precisely what Carmelo Ezpeleta tried to make people understand. But the damage is done. And the situation is as follows: “ you need consistency. This is the main argument. I agree, the current system isn't great, but how are we going to fix it? How will Dorna, IRTA and the teams come up with a better system? », concludes Keith Huewen. Lynn Jarvis would he have an idea?
