Marco Bezzecchi has explained why he carried a wooden leg on his bike while celebrating his victory in the San Marino Grand Prix sprint race at Misano.
The factory Aprilia rider caught everyone’s attention when he grabbed what appeared to be a prosthetic leg – complete with a racing boot – on the cooldown lap following his victory in Saturday’s half-distance race.
While MotoGP riders usually wave their country or manufacturer’s flags in celebration, Bezzecchi’s choice of prop sparked intrigue among fans.
Speaking afterwards, the Italian revealed that the wooden leg featured in one of his favourite childhood films, while he also commissioned the artist from the movie to design his helmet for Misano.
“This is a wooden leg. Something that is present in an Italian film has the name ‘Tre uomini e una gamba’, which means three men and one leg,” he told TNT Sports.
“It’s an Italian film and they bring this leg all over Italy to try to go to a wedding. It’s super funny and it’s part of my childhood.
“And the artist of the leg is Garbett. So I decided to make a good helmet, and the artist is Garbett.”
Marco Bezzecchi, Aprilia Racing
Photo by: Danilo Di Giovanni / Getty Images
Bezzecchi led the first part of the race from pole position, but two errors in quick succession allowed the factory Ducati of Marc Marquez to snatch the top spot from him on lap six.
However, just a few corners later, the championship leader crashed his Ducati and retired from the race, handing the lead back to the home favourite.
Bezzecchi then held off the Gresini Ducati of Alex Marquez in the final laps to claim his second career sprint win, as well as the first for Aprilia since Barcelona last year.
“I didn’t really expect [Marquez to pass me at Turn 6] but I knew he would be close to it because I made a couple of mistakes, once in turn 13 when I lost the front, and then I went a bit wide in Turn 4,” he said.
“I lost concentration a bit and I prepared Turn 6 to exit fast in the back straight because I thought Marc wanted to pass me on the braking, but then he passed me there [at Turn 6].
“I wasn’t really expecting that but then when he passed me I kept myself calm and I was there. I didn’t know how [the race] could go, but it went like this.”
He added: “I am just happy for the win. It means that we worked in a good this weekend until now, and that we can also do a good job tomorrow. So happy for the day and the focus is on Sunday.”
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