Johann Zarco started the season like a whirlwind, adding two second places in the double event in Qatar and climbing to the leadership of the World Cup. After a crash in Portimao and an eighth place in Jerez , the Frenchman went to fifth position overall, but a new rush in France (2nd) and Italy (4th) placed him second in the championship, a consolidated position with his fourth podium of the course, in Barcelona , where he finished second again and was placed just 14 points behind the leader of the contest, his compatriot Fabio Quartararo .
Since then, Zarco has not returned to the podium and from the 101 points he scored in the first seven races of the season, he has gone on to score only 36 in the following six. Apparently, the only thing that has changed is that in Barcelona Pramac and Ducati announced the renewal of the Frenchman for the 2022 season.
Zarco has always been a peculiar rider, even in his time in Moto2 he never had a contract beyond the current season. In fact, when he was proclaimed champion in 2015, he did not renew until the end of the year.
When he made the leap to MotoGP , he continued with the same contractual instability, signing from year to year with Tech3 Yamaha (2017 and 2018), until he achieved a two-year contract with an official factory team: KTM .
That stability did not last long for him, that in the middle of his first season with the orange bikes he asked to terminate the second year of agreement, to then immediately remove KTM from the bike, an identical case to the one that Maverick Viñales has experienced this year with Yamaha.
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Zarco finished the 2019 season, the first of his two years in agreement with KTM, racing in LCR-Honda with a contract for the last three races of the season (Australia, Malaysia and Valencia), committing in Cheste with a third team that course , Ducati, which placed him in 2020 in the private Avintia training with only one year of commitment.
The Frenchman completed the difficult 2020 course with a podium finish in 14 races (3rd in Brno), but it was not until the end of the year that Ducati ‘promoted’ him to the Pramac satellite team, with a one-year contract and an option for a second if he met some minimums that he already reached in the fourth race.
Back to contractual stability, Zarco has lost the drive with which he started the season and is now fourth overall, 77 points behind the leader.
The explosion of his teammate and MotoGP rookie Jorge Martín has not helped the Frenchman keep his composure either, who since the double in Austria, with victories and third place for the Spaniard, in addition to two poles in a row, has scored fewer points (15 ) than his fellow rookie (48).
“I am lucky that I was able to make a good start to the season, because when I look at the overall now I see that both Pecco (Bagnaia) and (Joan) Mir , they had a perfect Sunday, fantastic victory for one and a solid third place for the other. Zarco explained after the Motorland race, where he crossed the finish line 17th, out of the points
“So I was the clear loser on Sunday. But if they did it, I can do it too, it’s just not my time, but my time has to come back”, added a Zarco who is now fighting with Quartararo , Bagnaia and Mir to be on “the final podium of the season, that’s the objective and I will fight to the maximum to achieve it”.
Zarco, who since returning from the summer break has been suffering from compartment syndrome in his right arm and is considering surgery in the gap between the race in Austin (October 3) and the second in Misano (24 of the same month), no he wants to make that excuse to understand his poor results.
“Sunday was very hard, very disappointing, I don’t even know what to say. I didn’t have any problems with my arm, maybe because the track was turning to the left, and that helps. But I lacked confidence. I’m working on the feeling, on Saturday we found something (he qualified 10th), but it really wasn’t enough for the race”.
I have to forget about this race and look forward to the next one with a free spirit to find the right positions. I am very disappointed, but not destroyed because it is not the end of the world”, settled the boy from the Côte d’Azur .
