Doubt still hovers over Marc Márquez: "I already warned, I have realistic goals"

• Chronicle The victory of Enea Bastianini presents another disoriented World Cup

There is something childish in that illusion, it happened many times in the cinema, it is inevitable.

MotoGP fans, along with the organizers, the sponsors, the mechanics and even the opponents await the miracle: that Superman rises from the rubble, that Gandalf returns, that

and

recover their superpowers.

But life...

has been repeating for two years that he is no longer what he used to be, that he must consider other goals, that his horizon is already different, and for two years the world that revolves around him has been celebrating his resurrection .

And again.

Every moment.

With every little success.

The penultimate time was the most hopeful: last fall he chained two victories in a row and again the option of his seventh World Cup opened before him.

Then came his accident while he was training, his right eye injury and tempers cooled.

Until this week in Qatar.

On this occasion it was Márquez himself who lit up the party.

Was he back?

After his sudden recovery from ocular diplopia, moving to Madrid and the first weeks of treatment at the hands of Dr.

's personal physician

, the pilot announced in training on Friday that for the first time in a long time time had flown free.

“I have ridden without pain.

I already came here very optimistic, because I felt good at home and finally I have ridden without pain.

Last year it was a constant pain and with infiltrations, anti-inflammatories, but this time I have ridden without further ado and I have not noticed any pain, which is the most important thing”, he confessed and shortly after placed second on the Losail circuit grid, a layout that had never been especially good for him.

They were the necessary signs to announce him again on Olympus, surpassing

and

as the champion with the most titles ever, but once again reality prevailed.

This Sunday in the race Márquez could only finish fifth, his worst result ever in Qatar.

It is true that in the emirate he had only achieved one victory, in 2014, the season that chained 10 consecutive wins, but it is also true that he had climbed up to four more times on the podium.

And this time he stayed away.

With several conditions in his favor.

After a splendid start, he came to lead the race momentarily in an exchange with his teammate,

, but it didn't take him long to give up his second place.

, the eventual winner, and

, second classified, overtake him

, and in the final laps he could not hold on to fourth position against

and his Aprilia.

In a race in which all the favorites failed, such as

, desperate due to the slowness of his Yamaha, or

, who crashed taking

with him , Márquez could only deliver.

"I have never hidden myself"

At the end, not without annoyance, he repeated the speech learned in the last two years: «You always want more, you want to win or be on the podium, but I already warned, I have never hidden, I have realistic goals.

This circuit has always been difficult for me, it was the first race of the season... Besides, it went very fast.

I tried to follow Pol, but I suffered a lot from the front behind.

I have given my maximum and physically I have endured well.

I'll have to improve."

For Márquez, the year seems clearer than the previous one, but his physical limitations are still visible.

To his credit, the new Honda is much faster, as Pol Espargaró's third place showed.

Against him, that the new Honda is bigger and more stable, contrary to his riding style.

The Japanese brand, affected in its routines by covid during the last two seasons, has wanted to develop a motorcycle that can adapt to other riders and that may help Márquez in the long term, but today it delays his improvement even more.

Now the World Cup travels to the Indonesian circuit, a premiere, an unknown, and then will return in April to the American tour (Argentina and Austin) from which Márquez has almost always emerged victorious.

There, given the problems of his biggest opponents, he could even become the leader of the championship and, again, of course, the expectation for his resurgence will return.

Although there is something childish in that illusion, it is inevitable: it happened many times in the cinema.

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