MotoGP's Marquez era

Just five rounds remain in this year's MotoGP season, and there's every chance that we could be crowning the series' first rookie champion since Kenny Roberts Sr. all the way back in 1978.

Marc Marquez's performances so far this year have marked the young Spaniard as nothing short as a phenomenon. His pace isn't surprising - he demonstrated that lucidly in the Moto2 and 125cc classes - but his sheer consistency is.

Marquez may be riding the best bike in the field, but the fact he has finished on the podium in every race bar one (the sole exception being Mugello, where he crashed) must give his opposition some serious food for thought. If he's this good in his first season, how good is he going to be three or four years down the line?

Marquez has already beaten Valentino Rossi's benchmark of 10 podium finishes in his rookie season, set in the his first season on 500cc machinery in 2000. And, arguably, Marquez has been able to do so in the face of stiffer opposition than the Italian encountered.

Jorge Lorenzo has been, certainly in recent races, Marquez's most formidable foe. The Yamaha rider has re-gained the momentum he lost when he fractured his collarbone during practice for the Dutch TT, winning the last two races in very contrasting styles - coming out on top in an epic last-lap duel with Marquez at Silverstone, and simply galloping away from the rest of the field at Misano.

Yamaha are bullish about their prospects for the rest of the year, but it will be no easy task for Lorenzo to deny his compatriot Marquez the crown. The gap between the pair stands at 34 points; with five races left, Marquez can afford to finish second at each of them to assure himself of the title.

What about the other rider still realistically in the title hunt, Marquez's Repsol Honda teammate Dani Pedrosa? Unfortunately, his chances of finally claiming that elusive maiden premier-class crown are looking frail, despite being level on points with Lorenzo.

For one thing, Pedrosa cannot rely on having a bike advantage in the same way that Lorenzo may be able to. He has to beat Marquez purely on merit, something he hasn't managed to do since Catalunya all the way back in June. You have to go back further still, to Le Mans in May, for Pedrosa's last race victory.

As Toby Moody pointed out in a recent column for Autosport, it must be pretty demoralising to see your teammate dislocate his collarbone mere hours before the start of a race, just as Marquez did at Silverstone, only for him to beat you just as easily as he managed at the last race.

The situation must surely beg the question of whether Pedrosa, the man who boasts the unenviable record of having racked up the most premier class wins without having won a title, is ever going to break his duck.

It's mighty unfortunate for Pedrosa that, just as Casey Stoner departed the scene whilst still more or less at the peak of his powers, he ends up with perhaps the most impressive rookie the championship has ever seen as his teammate.

Back in April, I thought Pedrosa's window of opportunity, before Marquez would get well and truly up to speed, would last at least a year, particularly given his strong form towards the end of last year. But, in reality, it lasted less than half a season. It's difficult to see where he goes from here.

It's a mighty shame, in many ways, that Stoner decided to leave MotoGP at the time he did. Had he remained this year, Marquez may have been forced to ride a satellite Honda, thereby giving us a tantalising glimpse of his potential rather before having his considerable talent unleashed by a factory ride.

What's more, a Stoner-Marquez battle for supremacy, both aboard Repsol Hondas, would have been a spectacle to behold. A Stoner comeback seems a dim prospect at best, but it would provide a welcome layer of intrigue to proceedings if Marquez were to start to dominate in a Rossi-like fashion.

The tragic death of Marco Simoncelli at Sepang towards the end of 2011 has also, in retrospect, robbed fans of another potential rival to Marquez. The lanky Italian was poised to be the ideal successor to Rossi in the lineage of Italian Grand Prix racing heroes, and would have surely been capable of at least giving Marquez a decent run for his money.

Without wishing to take anything away from the likes of Andrea Dovizioso and Andrea Iannone, it seems that Italian fans have a while to wait yet for their next real championship contender. Spain, on the other hand, seem to have no shortage of talent making their way through the Moto2 and Moto3 classes.

The next Spaniard poised to make his MotoGP debut is Pol Espargaro, Marquez's closest challenger in Moto2 last season. Yamaha appear to be hoping that he can become a serious threat to Marquez sooner rather than later, having signed Moto2 title contender Pol Espargaro to ride for Tech 3 Yamaha next season.

But, Espargaro may be forced to wait for a factory Yamaha seat for a few seasons yet. Lorenzo, probably the Japanese factory's biggest asset, is going nowhere soon, whilst Rossi's marketing value can hardly be underestimated even if he's not quite the rider he was five years ago.

That said, Yamaha would surely jump on the chance to sign Marquez if he was to become available. MotoGP's commercial rights holder, Dorna Sports, would no doubt love such a move to come off, as it would fuel fan interest much as Rossi's switch to Yamaha from Honda did back in 2004.

That particular plot-line, combined with Rossi's peerless charisma and his rivalries with riders such as Max Biaggi and Sete Gibernau were sufficient to maintain interest in the sport even while 'The Doctor' set about racking up the wins. Contrast that to the Mick Doohan era of the mid-to-late nineties, when spectator interest dipped and World Superbikes consequently took up the slack.

At the height of Doohan's supremacy in 1997, there were few, if any, other riders in the field who could be considered of the Australian's calibre. That shouldn't be the case in a hypothetical Marquez era, if only because Lorenzo still theoretically has at least five or so good years left in him.

But, it's too soon to say whether up-and-coming riders such as Espargaro and Scott Redding will be good enough to challenge Marquez. Let's hope that they are, or else this next chapter of MotoGP history may not be looked back upon particularly fondly.