Magny-Cours WorldSBK: Garrett Gerloff: “No love lost with Scott, but hard to 100% blame him”

Garrett Gerloff has refused to blame Scott Redding for their collision in the Superpole Race at Magny-Cours, despite the 2020 WorldSBK runner-up receiving a Long Lap penalty.
Scott Redding, BMW WorldSBK Magny-Cours 2023
Scott Redding, BMW WorldSBK Magny-Cours 2023

The Bonovo Action BMW rider put forward his best showing of✃ the season after claiming a maiden Wo🧔rldSBK pole.

Race 1 was equally as strong, with Gerloff managing to f💜inish ༺fourth which is his best result of the season.

The American was then🅺 fifth in Race 2 as he came from outside the top ten to rescue a big points finish, however, it was the Superpole Race that had Gerloff wondering what c🍸ould have been.

After a poor start to th✅e lap, Gerloff, who was already pushed down the order, came 🐟to blows with fellow BMW rider Redding.

Redding went for a small gap on the 🅘inside of Gerloff before hitting the former Yamaha rider, which resulted in both men crashing out.

"We were going through Turn 8 and I didn’t feel like I was wide at all; in fact, I f☂eel like I was more inside compa🌃red to most other laps," said Gerloff. 

"Then, before I knew it, I was on the grou﷽nd with somebody else. It happened so fast fo༒r me… we were already crashing by the time I saw who it was. 

"It’s one of those things🌌. I know he didn’t mean to; there’s no love ꩲlost and I shouldn’t have even been in that situation anyway as I went straight through Turn 6. 

"Had Iꩵ been on my normal line through Turns 6 and 7 and just been doing my thing, then I wouldn’t have even see🌳n Scott, so it’s hard to blame it 100% on him. 

"This weekend has been the best I’ve felt in a really long time and I don’t feel like I’m stretching myself, I’m just there and then I look 🔯up at the end of the session and I’m in the top two and top three. We’ve made a big step and I hope we can continue."

Garrett Gerloff, French WorldSBK, 9 September
Garrett Gerloff, French WorldSBK, 9 September

For Redꦗding, Suꦚnday’s double raceday was a disaster as he only crashed in Race 2 with Dominique Aegerter.

Redding received another penalty for that accident and call🌠ed it a ‘strange’ weekend.

"Not my best weekend of luck," added Redding. "I felt good with the bike this weekend but I was just a little bit unlucky with a coupl♌e of crashes. 

"I don’t ever remember crashing three timesᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚ in a weekend, so it was quite strange. It th🉐ink because it was so close with the laps times and to get the results there is really small room for error. 

"Obviously we had a crash in race two be🎃fore the re-start. The guys did a great jobဣ to get the bike ready to start the final race – it was quite damaged. 

"I felt good at the re-start and then I had two long lap penalties to do. For me it was important to do them, but I made a goo🐬d start and made up positions. 

"Then I started to have some small e🍨ngine troubles. I think that was fro🧔m the crashes this weekend, maybe I damaged the engine. 

"It was not a good weekend for us rꦜegarding results, but we had the pace and we felt good. So we♓ need to see if we can come back a little bit at Aragon."

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