MotoGP: Marc Marquez's Pole Position Snatched Away by Controversial Glitch Prompts Race Director Response

Saajan Jogia | Oct 5, 2024

Apr 13, 2024; Austin, TX, USA; Marc Marquez (93) of Spain and Gresini Racing MotoGP rides during the qualifying session for the MotoGP Grand Prix of the Americas at Circuit of The Americas. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-Imagn Images / Jerome Miron-Imagn Images

Gresini rider Marc Marquez initially secured pole position in the Motegi MotoGP sprint qualifying, but his lap was later deleted due to a track limits infringement. However, the notification of the violation came after the session had concluded, leaving his team furious over the delayed response. Despite starting from 9th on the grid, Marquez fought his way up to finish in third, though his team demanded clarification on why the track limits violation was reported so late.

Marquez set a quick time of 1:42.868s in Q2 to take the provisional pole position, but much later, the lap time was deleted after the chequered flag was waved. Given the raindrops that began to fall toward the end of the session, the Spaniard opted not to push for a faster time.

However, it was later revealed that Marquez's track time was deleted due to a glitch in the system that sends notifications from the sensors housed alongside the track by the run-off area. Because of a glitch, the stewards had to input the lap manually into the system before it could be made official, unlike an automatic entry that should have happened if it wasn't for the glitch in the software.

Crash.net contacted Dorna Sports for a statement. Race director Mike Webb said:

“The track limits sensor was triggered immediately, which leads to the automatic cancellation of any lap.

“The FIM MotoGP Stewards entered it into the system right away, but unfortunately, a software glitch interrupted this process and meant the lap then needed to be cancelled manually, causing a delay to the notification.

“This is the first time this has happened in thousands of track limits infractions investigated each season.

“The cause of this glitch has been located and the system adjusted in order to ensure it cannot happen again.”

Commenting on the incident, Marquez told TNT Sport, as reported by Crash.net:

“Yeah, of course this morning was a bit confusing, especially for that late notification because on the bike it’s impossible to realise if you touch the green sometimes or not.

“Then I saw the lap was not cancelled, so I said ‘Ok, there’s no point to pushing more’, because there were some drops [of rain].

“So I said with that lap time I’ll be on the front row, which was the target.

“Unfortunately for us, there was that very late notification.

“The stewards told me that they had problems with the connections.

“Unlucky, but it is what it is. The job was try to forget that, concentrate on the sprint race and we did our best one more time.”