Photo credits: Crash
With the first race of the season almost here, the MotoGP championship is set to adopt a new penalty rule starting in 2019: the “Long Lap Penalty”. This is the newest form of penalizing riders for bad behavior on track during a MotoGP race.
With this decision, MotoGP stewards will be able to choose a new penalty, which requires penalized riders to ride through a specially marked area on the track. This “Long Lap Penalty” rule was first tested during the recent MotoGP tests in Qatar, with positive feedback from riders such as Valentino Rossi and Andrea Dovizioso.
At the Losail circuit, modifications were made at turn 6 runaway area, off-track, with a pair of white lines drawn on the asphalt. If a rider does something wrong during the race, the race stewards will be able to issue this penalty, and riders will need to ride on this specially marked layout of the track.
One good example for stewards to impose the “Long Lap Penalty” rule is when a rider gains positions cutting corners. Instead of giving the position away, letting his rivals pass by again, he won’t need to slow down immediately, but he’ll need to go through the Long Lap Penalty zone. According to Rossi, whoever is penalized like that, will lose around 3 seconds per lap.
This new rule is set to be written into the official MotoGP rules in the next few days, just in time to be used from the first race of the season onwards.
Carmelo Ezpeleta, Dorna CEO, says that this rule will be an addition to all the other rules already used be stewards to penalize riders, and it won’t be a rule created to replace other rules.
The “Long Lap Penalty” rule is to be applied at every MotoGP race, on a specific corner (whenever it is possible), with Race Direction members Franco Uncini and Loris Capirossi, as well as Carmelo Ezpeleta, choosing where to draw the lines at a specific corner or area of the track.