Quote Originally Posted by madvlad View Post
Great ride by Marquez this past weekend, wonder if that'll give him the confidence to get out of his head and make a charge for the front of the points at the end of the year (not the title obviously as he's too far gone now but be up there within the top 5). Oliviera man, that dude is on a roll with KTM and is showing more and more consistency as the season advances. Yamaha shows their weakness is far from being fixed, holy shit those guys got their asses handed this weekend. Fabio seems to be the only one of that group to have that bike figured out, MV lashed out at Yamaha and again I don't see this relationship ending well in between these two (cue Lorenzo licking his chops)

In other news, Cameron Beaubier with a hell of a result from 23rd to 10th, he's gaining strength as the rounds go on. Garrett Gerloff did very well at the Navarra test and is feeling pretty confident (running up there head to head with Toprak), hope this dude gets a chance at a factory ride soon, he's shown insane pace. If it wouldn't have been for the penalty due to this last couple mistakes, he would have challenged for the win at Misano without a doubt. Love seeing Jake Gagne finally doing his thing and back to form in M.A, that dude is untouchable this season even with Barbera and Baz on the grid. Pretty good year of racing overall in all levels so far, we'll see what happens after the summer break since things tend to change for some pretty drastically.
I agree with you on Olivera. He's very fast and has seemed to figured out the KTM. Always thought Binder would have emerged as the main guy but Olivera seems to be the one at the moment. I think Marquez was a bit of a one off for him at Sachsenring. He's never lost there and I think that was extra motivation. Not sure how he is going to go at other tracks, especially with the right arm not 100% and the Honda not really developed at this point.

For me, Yamaha is doing what Yamaha always do. Come apart like a cheap watch. If Fabio can manage a few more wins this year and keep getting podiums or top 4-5's, then I think he's going to get the title. I think Olivera is coming for him though, and I think a few others are as well. Vinales just looked lost again. He's dominant in one race and is no where to be found in the next. He's unpredictable and not consistent. Rossi was second fastest M1 and was 22 seconds from the winner, but 16 seconds from Quatararo. That's not great but not entirely bad either. Morbidelli and Vinales were both 24 seconds off and last. Yamaha looked bad this weekend but Fabio managed it.

I think Beaubier is finding out the hard way just how fast the world level elite really are. He is doing very well but he went from winning by a country mile in MotoAmerica to getting spanked by the Moto2 crowd. Gerloff is doing better in WSBK but not that much. He's getting there but he's far from Rea, Toprak, Redding and a few others. He will get there sooner I think. Beaubier has a massive learning curve still.

Roll on Assen GP and then let's see what surprises the Summer break has in store...