While strolling down the Losail pit lane before the Friday sun had gone down, I saw Danilo Petrucci giving a demonstration to Italian TV about riding position on his Pramac Ducati. I made the assumption that Petrucci was on an imagined lap of the Qatar circuit, narrating as he went about how he managed throttle control and the front brake lever.

While not wanting to intrude on the situation, I was nonetheless fascinated by how Petrucci’s hand and wrist changed position on this imaginary lap. When a rider has his gloves on, there is only so much we can see, even in still images, about what is going on beneath the leather, padding and plastic armor.

With Petrucci’s right hand exposed, many details are visible. I snapped away and have selected a series of images that shows the various positions he gets into on track.

Petrucci describes his actions for Italian TV as he ‘rides’ around Losail.

On the brakes, two fingers with index finger in deepest section of brake lever.

Left turn entry, fingers move away from the brake lever back to throttle.

For a moment his fingers are fairly neutral, but this doesn’t last long.

At full lean his fingers are now diagonal on the throttle. Petrucci is 180cm (5′ 10.8″) tall, one of the taller riders in MotoGP. Imagine what the shorter riders’ wrist positions look like at full lean as they try to get their shoulders as far to one side of the bike as possible.

Moving back to a neutral position.

Preparing to grab for brake lever.

Continues on the next page: