Kaleidoscope 2023: F1 Less Greget, Drama In MotoGP, And Racing In Indonesia

Francesco Bagnaia MotoGP 2023 champion (Instagram/@motogp).

JAKARTA 2023 will soon pass. Many interesting events color the course of the two most prestigious racing worlds in the world, namely Formula 1 (F1) and MotoGP.

The F1 world title was determined before the final series, to be precise at the Qatar Grand Prix at the Losail International Circuit, Sunday, October 8, 2023. Again, Max Verstappen again guarded the championship crown for the third time in a row.

The remaining number of series during the F1 world title were five series, namely the United States Grand Prix, the Mexican Grand Prix, the Brazilian Grand Prix, the Las Vegas Grand Prix, and the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.

Meanwhile, the most interesting drama is presented by MotoGP. In this race, the determination of the title must still be awaited until the final series at the Ricardo Tormo Circuit, Valencia, Spain, Sunday, November 26, 2023.

MotoGP 2023

The only newcomer to MotoGP 2023 is Augusto Fernandez. The 26-year-old Spaniard is promoted from Moto2 to MotoGP and defends the GAS Factory Team with his country's compatriot, Pol Espargaro.

In addition, there are also riders who change teams to face MotoGP 2023, including Alex Rins and Joan Mir. The exit of the Suzuki team from this prestigious event at the end of the 2022 season made the two riders have to find a new team.

Joan Mir left for Repsol Honda to join six-time world champion from Spain, Marc Marquez. Meanwhile, Alex Rins joined the LCR Honda satellite team to join the Japanese racer, Takaaki Nagakami.

The competition towards the 2023 MotoGP title was very fierce. You see, MotoGP officially introduced a sprint race on Saturday in all series. Therefore, a total of 40 races have been undertaken by racers from 20 series.

The sprint race takes half of the distance from the main race in each draw. The points given for the champion are half of the points obtained in the main race.

Just like the previous season, the 2023 MotoGP race was very dramatic. Certainty regarding who comes out as world champion must be determined in the final series in Valencia.

Throughout this season Francesco Bagnaia of Ducati Lenovo Team competed with Jorge Martin (Prima Pramac) to win the title. The competition between the two took place really dramatically.

Bagnaia was evicted from the top position of the standings after Martin won the sprint race at the Mandalika International Circuit. Martin's sixth victory in the 2023 MotoGP sprint was also obtained with good results because he started from the sixth position.

The result made Martin move up to first place in the standings and lead a seven-point lead over Bagnaia. However, he only sat in less than 24 hours.

When the main race was held, Martin failed to finish in the accident. On the other hand, Bagnaia was able to take advantage of this opportunity. He came out as champion so he returned to the top of the standings with an 18-point advantage.

Bagnaia then led a 21-point lead when they arrived in Valencia to face the final draw. In that position, the Italian only needs to add a four-point advantage to seal the world title in the sprint race.

Unfortunately, Martin postponed the Bagnaia title party by winning a sprint. Meanwhile, the defending champion finished in fifth position so that his advantage over Martin in the standings was cut to 14 points.

However, the main race went very smoothly for Bagnaia. The determination of the title was then plenary after his competitor Jorge Martin fell at Turn Four on lap six. Meanwhile, Bagnaia appeared calm until she won the race.

Formula 1 2023

Only four teams have not changed the composition of their riders from the previous season to face the 2023 season. The four teams in question are Alfa Romeo, Mercedes, Ferrari, and Red Bull Racing.

Red Bull as the constructors' champion last season remained relying on the duo Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez. Ferrari also has the same line-up for the third year in a row after continuing cooperation with Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz Jr.

Mercedes is still loyal to Lewis Hamilton and George Russell. Meanwhile, Alfa Romeo still entrusted their seats to Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu.

The other team outside the four names used the same pattern for the season. They kept one of their old riders and recruited one new rider.

The first is Pierre Gasly moving from AlphaTauri to Alpine. There, he duets with Esteban Ocon so that they automatically form a French duet for manufacturers from France as well.

The vacant position left by Gasly was then filled by Nyck de Vries. The Dutch racer with Indonesian blood as well as the 2020-2021 Formula E world champion is lined up with Japanese racer Yuki Tsunoda, who will undergo her third year in F1.

Next, Fernando Alonso moved to Aston Martin. There, he duets with Lance Stroll left by Sebastian Vettel for retiring.

Then, Haas defended Kevin Magnussen. However, they decided to replace Mick Schumacher with Nico Hulkenberg, who was previously Aston Martin's reserve racer.

Meanwhile, Williams continued to fence off England-Thailand racer Alexander Albon. They then signed LoganZiant from Formula 2 as Albon's companion after ending the collaboration with Nicholas Latifi.

The last team was McLaren who brought in Oscar Piastri for a duet with Lando Norris. Piastri last season became an Alpine test racer. Meanwhile, Daniel Ricciardo withdrew and is now a Red Bull reserve rider.

Max Verstappen then won the F1 world title for the third time in a row after coming out as the champion of the 2023 season. The victory of the Belgian-Dutch racer was accompanied by a number of amazing records.

Verstappen closed the 2023 season with a collection of 575 points or ahead of 290 points over his teammate, Sergio Perez, who is runner-up. The difference in points was the biggest in history, past Sebastian Vettel's record 155 points difference in 2023.

In addition, Verstappen's number of points is the most in history for one race season. He surpassed his own record of 454 points in 2022 and widened a distance of 162 better than Hamilton's achievements in 2019.

On the way to winning this season's title, Verstappen also managed to carve out a total of 19 wins. This record made him successfully break the record in his own name after winning 15 wins in the previous season.

Another record that Verstappen managed to make was the most consecutive wins (10 wins). This achievement surpassed the previous record of nine consecutive wins made by Vettel in 2013.

Sainz then stopped Verstappen's victory in the Singapore Grand Prix. However, Verstappen successfully won the remaining seven races afterwards.

Another historic record Verstappen made was a total of 1,003 laps. This record surpassed Sebastian Vettel in 2011 who led 739 laps. Finally, he packed the most sprint wins (4 wins).

Racing In Mandalika

In addition to holding MotoGP, Mandalika is also trusted to host a 2023 World Superbike (WSBK) race series. This is the second time the World Superbike race has been held in Mandalika after 2022.

The WSBK race in Mandalika 2023 was dominated by Alvaro Bautista. The WSBK 2022 champion racer successfully won Race 1 and Race 2 so he left Lombok as the leader of the standings with 112 points, followed by Toprak Razgatlioglu in second place with 75 points.

Formula E Race

In addition to holding the two races above, Indonesia is also busy with Formula E events for the second year in a row. For this year, the race was held twice, respectively on Saturday, June 3, 2023, and Sunday, June 4, 2023.

A week before this year's race, Formula E at the AGI Jakarta International E-Prix Circuit was not as busy as the previous year which was attended by 18 thousand people. The crowd at that time occurred due to the controversy that accompanied the preparation of this event.

However, tickets for Formula E 2023 are still sold out. The implementing committee for Formula E Jakarta 2023 from PT Jakarta Propertindo (Perseroda) targets as many as 20 thousand spectators to be able to watch live racing in the circuit area and 50 thousand spectators on the entertainment stage.

In Saturday's race, June 3, 2023, Pascal Wehrlein from TAG Heuer Porsche came out as champions. He finished fastest ahead of Jake Denish in second and Maximilian Guenther.

Meanwhile, in Sunday's race, it was Guenther's turn to win the race. The Maserati MSG Racing racer finished first ahead of Denish and Avalanche Andretti.