Trackhouse put both of its Aprilias on the podium behind him while the factory rider and points leader finished fifth, 11.372s down. Martin goes to the summer break with two new men behind him and a lead that has stopped meaning what it did in June.

Jeremy Clarke put the Inter Europol ORECA on pole with a track record. Dillmann lost the lead in the middle of the race, took it back around the outside at Clayton, and won by 9.796s on the circuit that broke two of his vertebrae.

The 6 Hours of Sao Paulo was the first race balanced under the WEC’s policy of not publishing the numbers. BMW won it by 2.254s. Whether the correction was proportionate is now, by design, a thing nobody outside the room can check.

Martin and Ogura are 14 points apart at the top and both leave in 2027. The two Aprilia keeps are the ones in the medical centre. A manufacturer can win a championship and still be holding nothing at the end of it.

Vinales says KTM sent him a Tech3 deal at Mugello, that he signed it, and that the team then told him it was void. He says he is burnt out and expects to leave the series. It is the clearest account yet of what a shrinking grid does to its veterans.

A transporter fire destroyed the one-of-one braking system Robert Wickens races with. Bosch, Pratt Miller, DXDT and Corvette Racing built a replacement and had it in Canada inside a month. Then a throttle return spring took his home win away.

The Macarena wing flips the rear flap over to shed drag, and it is the quickest thing Red Bull has on a straight. Two failures and an FIA compliance query land in the week the paddock reaches Spa, where keeping it and dropping it both cost lap time.

The first public timed run of the car Formula E races next season was not a demonstration. It was a benchmark, produced by an event with no stake in flattering it.