DO YOU BELIEVE in fairytales? For most of the final weekend of an exhaustive season, Fabio Quartararo (Monster Energy Yamaha) attempted to write his own one here, as he fought and scrapped for a podium until the bitter end to make this a championship showdown that featured a reasonable degree of jeopardy.
While the Frenchman eventually fell short, it was left to Alex Rins (Ecstar Suzuki) to deliver, the Spaniard scoring an incredible send-off win in Suzuki’s MotoGP swansong. His lights-to-flag triumph – a second in three outings – was as surprising as it was convincing, with the #42 getting a supreme launch to lead into the first corner. Despite the close attentions of Jorge Martin (Pramac Ducati) and, latterly, a resurgent Brad Binder (Red Bull KTM), he was never headed.
“We could not finish any better,” Rins rightly opined soon after.
But even Suzuki’s fairytale goodbye could not compete in the attention stakes with the real story at hand: Francesco Bagnaia’s (Lenovo Ducati) nervy ninth place was enough to end Ducati’s premier-class drought that stretched 15 years. The Italian was rarely convincing over three intense days, packed with pressure. Yet coming to Valencia needing just a 14th place to secure his second world title, he didn’t need to be. His real work was done in the nine races before, when he
