Expert panel provide judgement on Jorge Martin comeback - and his MotoGP podium hope

Reigning MotoGP world champion marked his return to racing at the Czech Grand Prix with an impressive run to seventh in the main race.

The 2024 champion has been absent since suffering multiple injuries in a crash during the Qatar Grand Prix, meaning Brno was just his second round as a competitor out of the first 12.

With the contract dispute between himself and Aprilia laid to rest, questions turned to what Jorge Martin’s motivation would be like.

Sunday’s grand prix delivered an emphatic answer, as he went from 12th on the grid to seventh in the 21-lap race.

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“Aprilia deserves a lot of praise,” Crash MotoGP Podcast host Jordan Moreland says.

“They’ve been clearly the second-best manufacturer. Marco Bezzecchi continues to impress with his performances.

“Another second place and he was the guy who took it early to Marc [Marquez].

“But Jorge Martin is the guy everyone was focusing on.

“That relationship, on camera anyway, and in the garage after was actually quite nice and refreshing to see they’re all embracing each other despite the things that have been said.

“Martin seventh in the grand prix is a really good result in the grand scheme of the kilometres of the season he’s done far.”

Crash MotoGP Editor Peter McLaren labelled Martin’s return as “perfect” and believes the working relationship between himself and Aprilia is clearly going well.

“It began with a bit of an awkward press conference, where Martin confirmed he was staying but at the same time said he didn’t regret trying to leave,” McLaren added.

“I think it was almost a perfect weekend for Martin, under the circumstances, because the most important thing was he didn’t fall off the bike.

“He didn’t get hurt again, but he built his confidence, he just got laps under his belt that he needed and just improved over the weekend.

“He showed that, seventh place is nothing for a world champion to be too happy about, but under the circumstances I think it’s the perfect situation for him now.

“He’s gotten through that awkward first weekend with Aprilia, he’s working with the team, they’re starting to rebuild the trust and at the same time he can see that the bike is quick.”

Martin now has a three-week break to analyse his performance from Brno ahead of the second half of the season.

But Crash Senior Journalist Lewis Duncan believes Martin has put himself into a position to be able to fight for podiums later in the year if he continues his progression.

“I think the starting point is good," he said.

“15.8s from the win in the top seven is not bad considering he has about 180km in race mileage compared to about 1200km for Marc this year.

“I think the thing that stood out for me more was his pace relative to Bezzecchi.

“He was about half a second a lap slower than Bez, which given he’s competed in two out of the 12 rounds this year, didn’t have any pre-season testing time, hasn’t developed the bike, I think that’s really good to be within just over half a second of your team-mate on pure pace.

“This is a team-mate who has won a grand prix this year, has regularly been fighting for the podium recently.

“That’s really good. Probably by the time we get into the last races of the season we’ll see Jorge Martin back on the podium, I think if he carries on doing what he’s doing.”