Friday 11 October 2013

Marquez Receives Penalty

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World championship leader Marc Marquez has been given a penalty point for a clash with Honda team-mate Dani Pedrosa in last month's Aragon Grand Prix.

The 20-year-old, who leads by 39 points with four races left, clipped Pedrosa and caused his bike to flip over.

Marquez has now accrued three penalty points, only one away from being put at the back of the grid for the next race.

Honda were docked the 25 points won in Aragon and are now only a point ahead of Yamaha in the constructors' series.

Pedrosa, 28, who finished second in the championship last season, was incensed by the incident, and accused Marquez of being too aggressive in his riding.

"I would like to know where is the limit in racing because I also can ride aggressively and over the limit," he told BBC Sport after the Aragon race.

Under new rules introduced this season,MotoGP hands out penalty points for on-track transgressions, and in addition to the back of the grid, seven points means a start from pit-lane, while 10 incurs a ban from the next race.

MotoGP analysed the Aragon crash at a race cirection hearing at Malaysia's Sepang circuit on Thursday with Marquez, Pedrosa and Honda team members present.

"A touch from [Marquez's] left arm broke the rear wheel speed sensor cable on the back of Pedrosa's bike, resulting in a loss of his traction control for the latter which saw him crashing out of the race," it said on its website.

Race Director Mike Webb added: "We are sending a message to Marc, we understand that he is an extremely talented rider but he is also intelligent enough to understand that there has to be some margin for error - especially, as we have seen a number of times this year, under braking when the rider behind has the responsibility of not getting too close to the rider in front who is riding his own lines.

"We have had an incident in which Marc has been very close to another rider - close enough to make contact - when coming from behind under braking. For us, that is a signal [even though the contact itself was quite minor] to make a formal warning by way of a penalty point to Marc to say he has to take more care."

Spanish rookie Marquez, who leads the championship from reigning champion Jorge Lorenzo, previously incurred two penalty points when deemed to have ignored yellow flags from another rider's crash during the warm-up at Silverstone last month.


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