Marco Bezzecchi’s crash out of the Thai Grand Prix in Buriram didn’t come too soon to prevent him from discerning that the characteristic of the Ducati Desmosedici GP23 that has held him back in dry conditions this season is also a problem in the wet.
Bezzecchi has struggled to get the GP23 turned all season in dry conditions, and the rider who scored three Grand Prix victories in 2023 has managed only one podium so far in 2024.
At Thailand, where, in 2022, Bezzecchi scored his first MotoGP pole position, rain on Sunday could have presented an opportunity to Bezzecchi, whose first MotoGP win came in the 2023 Argentinian Grand Prix.
“Normally, in the wet, I feel much better,” Bezzecchi said. “I also know that, in the wet, the conditions are always different: sometimes you are very good, sometimes you are shit.
“But, [...] I never felt good like last year in the wet, so it’s difficult to say if it’s the bike, the tyres, many things that we have. Just, the result is that I have never been fast like last year on the wet, also on the dry.
“To be honest, the feeling on the bike is very similar to the dry condition, the behaviour of the bike is the same, at the end it’s a characteristic that the bike has, so dry or wet, it doesn’t matter.”
Bezzecchi’s Thai Grand Prix ended in the gravel on the outside of turn one, where he became the first rider to crash out on lap four.
Bezzecchi’s summary of his race-ending crash in Buriram was simple: “I just made a mistake in the first corner,” he said.
He said that the beginning of the race had been difficult because of a lack of rear grip, but this wasn’t the cause of his crash.
“In the first lap, I lost a lot, I risked to crash four or five times,” Bezzecchi said. “I don’t know if I didn’t put enough temperature in the rear tyre, but I lost the rear so many times.
“[I was] risking even more compared to the first corner mistake. Fortunately I was able to not make a huge crash, but then when I started to recover a bit I tried a bit more in the first corner and I lost the front.
“I didn’t feel too bad with the setting of the bike, just this strange sensation, but at the end this sensation that I had didn’t create my crash, my crash was because I tried a bit too much in the first corner.”
