by Tracy Hagen

Strange, interesting, exciting – these are but a few of the words MotoGP riders used to describe unprecedented events that unfolded at the Australian Grand Prix.

Though Casey Stoner has won the last six Australian GPs, the GP at Phillip Island is regarded as being rather unpredictable. But this one caught everyone by surprise.

The chain of events that led to this black swan GP started in December when the circuit was re-surfaced for the first time in 14 years. The new asphalt is, according to published stated by circuit managing director Fergus Cameron, a secret mixture specially developed for Phillip Island that increased the level of grip from 55 to 74 on a coefficient of friction scale of 0-110.

Published reports from December state that Cameron supplied detailed information about the new surface to the tire manufacturers.

In February Phillip Island hosted the opening round of the World Superbike championship. Pirelli brought a wide assortment of tires for the superbikes and tire issues for the superbikes were not significant enough to cause DORNA to consider shortening the race. But in the Supersport division, tires were pitting and shredding starting from the first practice session. The Supersport raced was accordingly shortened from 21 to 15 laps, a decision made on the first day of the event.

Apparently DORNA ignored what transpired in World Supersport as a valid concern in any for the three World Championship classes that would race at Phillip Island in another eight months. There was certainly enough time to consider the possibility.

Unlike the swift decisions made in February for the World Supersport race, this time DORNA drip-fed decisions over the course of the weekend.

The first came on Friday with a ruling that MotoGP riders were required to only use the hard Bridgestone rear tires. Next came Saturday morning’s ruling that teams had to use these tires at inflation pressures specified by Bridgestone. Later on Saturday DORNA reduced race distance from 27 to 26 laps and mandated that riders were change bikes at least once during the race. Finally, on Sunday morning DORNA reduced race distance again to 19 laps and restricted rear tires to 10 laps.

In post-race video interviews some riders had problems with rear tires blistering after eight laps. Hence on Sunday morning DORNA had to decide whether to have each rider swap bikes twice or shorten the race so only one pit stop was needed.

DORNA was not alone in making haphazard decisions. Read on.

The race started per the 2013 script: Jorge Lorenzo blazed to the front on his Yamaha with the Repsol Honda riders of Dani Pedrosa and Marc Marquez in close pursuit. The rest of the riders were led, briefly, by Bradley Smith and later by Valentino Rossi.

In NASCAR fashion, DORNA opened the pits on lap 9. Pedrosa opted to pit at the last moment and, as a result, picked up a pit lane speeding penalty. Normally pit lane speeding during a race results in a ride-through penalty. But today the rulebook was suspended and DORNA made rules as needed to keep the race and MotoGP championship alive.

Lorenzo pitted on the following lap, which, according to the morning edition of the MotoGP rules was the last lap for pit stops. Marquez stayed out for another lap and pitted after the pits were closed. After the race Marquez made it clear that the team had planned to pit on lap 11.

The TV announcers knew immediately that Marquez had breached the rules the second he went past the pit entrance on lap 10. A minute and a half later Marquez went into the pits, performed an illegal pit stop, and re-joined the race.

As Marquez entered the track at Turn 1 Lorenzo and Pedrosa were at full-stick and headed straight for the championship leader. Lorenzo bounced off the side of Marquez but both stayed on the track and on the wheels.

With pit stops over DORNA had to start sorting through the list of pit lane violations. For Pedrosa, for speeding DORNA decided that if he gave up one position all would be forgiven. On lap 14 Pedrosa surrendered second to Marquez. To say Pedrosa got off lightly is an understatement: Marquez was already shown the black flag and, as far as DORNA was concerned, did not exist in the race anymore. Yet giving up a position to a rider that wasn’t there absolved Pedrosa for his earlier transgression.

Lorenzo won the farce just as rain was starting to fall. Pedrosa cruised to second, and Rossi took third after racing bar-to-bar with Alvaro Bautista and Cal Crutchlow from start to finish.

Lorenzo now trails Marquez by 18 points with two races to go. If Lorenzo wins the last two races and Marquez finishes third in each they will end up tied in points. The championship would go to Lorenzo on race wins.

Anything can happen.

Next race: Motegi, October 27