Former Honda rider Pol Espargaro raises alarm over extreme racing conditions in the Indian GP 

Pol Espargaro has raised alarm about the extreme racing conditions in the Indian GP as the temperature made life uncomfortable for all the riders.

The high temperatures were a concern for everyone during the tournament as the races were run in extreme humidity.

Riders had raised complaints about this after the first day of running, as the hot and humid conditions had led to a lot of issues. Such was the situation that the sprint race on Saturday (September 23) was reduced by a lap, while the main race on Sunday (September 24) was reduced by three laps.

Pol Espargaro too did not have a great outing as he could not finish one race and did not have a great result in the other one.

The Spaniard was not the only one who faced issues, as Jorge Martin was one of the more prominent riders who faced severe dehydration after the race. As quoted by Autosport, Espargaro was quite vocal about the conditions. He said:

"We cannot face these kinds of conditions, it's pretty tricky. We just put a sensor on the bike, on the fuel tank. It's where we breathe in the straights and it was like 65C. So the air is coming toward our body. So you can imagine this is hard."

Pol Espargaro added:

"Also because it was one of the longer races on the calendar. Like, for example, in Barcelona we took 38 minutes to make the race and to make this distance here it was about 42.5 minutes. So this was, I think, the longest race on the calendar. So together with the hottest conditions and higher humidity, I think it was too much."

---

Pol Espargaro and other riders set to talk about the Indian GP in the safety commission

Pol Espargaro revealed that the riders will discuss the situation in the safety commission meeting and the race may be moved to a slightly later date or whatever is more convenient when the weather is not as extreme. He said:

"We all the riders are going to talk a little bit in the safety commission, in the next one. The bike is a machine, it gets super hot, and this heat comes to [us] as well. So it's not just the ambient temperature, it's also the temperature the bike is delivering to the rider."

The Spaniard added:

"So I believe we are young, we are athletes, we are prepared for many things but this kind of temperature is a little bit over the limit. So maybe it's so easy to change the calendar a little bit to come in [to races] during better weather conditions. That would be great and it's possible so we need to think a little bit about it."

The provisional Indian GP appears to have been pushed back to early October. This should help with the weather, but it also must be noted that India has faced an uncharacteristic heatwave this year that has led to the temperatures rising this much.