After the crash in the MotoGP race last Sunday of the Spanish Grand Prix, many unknowns were opened around the physical condition of Marc Márquez. The main diagnosis was clear, a fracture in the humerus of his right arm, although it remained to be seen whether the nerve was affected, something that could lead to a ‘normal’ recovery period or to a longer and more complicated one. On Monday night nerve problems were ruled out. On Tuesday he underwent surgery and the head of the medical team, Dr. Xavier Mir, gave an optimistic scenario back for the appointment of the Czech Republic, on Friday, August 7. On Wednesday the news began to spread, anticipated by ‘El Periódico’, that Márquez’s plan was try it already this weekend in Jerez, where the Andalusian Grand Prix is held. Information that seems hard to believe but that was confirmed throughout the afternoon and evening.
This Thursday, at 11 in the morning, the Spanish pilot disembarked from a private plane at the Jerez airport with his team members, who had already returned home. A couple of hours earlier, his brother’s mechanics had reassembled his side of the ‘box’, which had been emptied on Sunday afternoon. At half past one in the afternoon Márquez received the approval of the circuit doctors, after the pertinent tests of strength (minutes before Cal Crutchlow also passed the control successfully, and shortly afterwards with the same result Alex Rins).
Marc came today, he has undergone a strict mechanical control and very rigid and very powerful support, and I must say that the exploration has been perfect, “said Ángel Charte, responsible for the championship’s medical services. “Despite what people may think, it is what marks the medical code and what we should do with that medical code,” he added.
“Originally, Honda’s position was to cancel the race and try it in Brno, but after we saw it, from Marc’s wish, after what the doctor said today, which has declared him fit, we have reached a situation in which he will try on Saturday, and after how he feels he will decide if he runs or not, ”explained Alberto Puig, Repsol Honda team manager, on Thursday about a plan that implies that the rider will skip free practice on Friday, once after the four days of working on the track last week in their box they consider that they have enough information to not need them. “But everything depends on how he feels on Saturday and whether we understand that he is capable of completing the race distance or not. If it is risky, Marc has also understood that our idea will be to cancel the race. From last Sunday until now things have gone so fast that we are surprised, “added Puig. It will be in two days when, depending on his physical sensations and the rhythm he is able to capture on the track, he will decide whether it is worth facing a challenge that resembles that of Jorge Lorenzo in 2013.
Risk assumed
The Majorcan a clavicle fractured on Thursday in training for the Netherlands Grand Prix, he operated that same night in Barcelona, returned to the Assen Circuit on Friday, and ran the race on Saturday (the day the Dutch test was traditionally held), only 35 hours after surgery, to finish fifth. Of course, two weeks later, at the Sachsenring, he fell again, which caused his left clavicle to fracture again.
But returning to itself to the fact of the express return of the Majorcan, although it is true that Márquez would count this time almost five full days, at the moment the competition in terms of motorcycles is much greater than that of that year, and the temperature conditions which are expected for Sunday much more extreme than those of that Saturday seven years ago.
«You cannot ask him not to go to the limit. If he is here it is because he thinks he can be here, at least a priori, it is not necessary to tell him to be careful, you know the risk involved and how dangerous this is, ”added Puig, who recognized that Honda has prioritized respecting the wishes of its pilot, in a year in which he started with a zero in his locker, and in a weekend from which he intends to get something positive considering that ahead, counting on Sunday, there are only twelve races.
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