Isolated in the lead, but under pressure from Cal Crutchlow who had just set the best time of the race, Marc Marquez fell and retired during the 8th lap of this 2016 Australian Grand Prix.
This is his first retirement of the season, which also comes after winning the title in Motegi and dominating most of the testing sessions which took place in a lottery atmosphere.
Seizing the race lead on the first lap to the detriment of Pol Espargaro, Marc Marquez managed a lead of 2,5 seconds over Cal Crutchlow when he fell, losing the front of his Honda when braking a little late at turn #4.
Marc Marquez: “First of all, I want to apologize to my team because I made a mistake today. We did everything to perfection and we just needed to take advantage of it with a result on Sunday. If I had fought for the title it would have been an entirely different race because I wouldn't have taken so many risks. Today I started strong because I knew I had to make a difference from the start.
I maintained the distance (with Crutchlow), but at one of the hard braking points, I braked too late, and instead of widening, which is what I had done throughout the year, I I tried to continue forcing.
In such cases, the line is narrow. We are of course happy because we had already won the title, but obviously we would have liked to win more races. It was completely my fault; during the whole season I was very careful on the braking points, and this time I took more risks, so this fall has nothing to do with the Michelin tires.
Now we have another race next week and we'll just think about that. Congratulations to Cal on a great victory.”
An opinion which therefore contradicts Jorge Lorenzo's complaint about his tires...
