Moto2

2020 Portimao Moto2 FP3 Result: Gardner Attacks The Timesheets

Submitted by Zara Daniela on

Despite enjoying the best of the conditions, the intermediate class were in no rush to make an impact on the combined standings and the time attack that closed the session wasn’t all that feisty either. Remy Gardner managed to surpass Friday’s benchmark in the final 5 minutes of FP3 and led the way by two tenths of a second, while Luca Marini’s FP2 time was enough to keep him second on the combined timesheets. Hector Garzo was one of the few early improvers and the Spaniard topped the session before dropping to third overall, with compatriot Marcos Ramirez up to fourth.

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2020 Portimao Moto2 FP2 Result: Lowes Surrenders To Marini

Submitted by Zara Daniela on

The final session of the day in Portimao saw intermediate class riders in no rush to improve FP1 times but the pace picked up for the final time attack and FP2 set things up nicely in the title battle. Luca Marini and Sam Lowes were some of the main men spending time at the top of the timing screens and it was the Italian one step (and one tenth) ahead at the checkered flag. Lowes overcame clearly visible pain after last week’s crash and showed good speed to finish second, one hundredth of a second faster than a resurgent Lorenzo Baldassarri.

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2020 Portimao Moto2 FP1 Result: Ramirez Sets The Benchmark

Submitted by Zara Daniela on

The intermediate class enjoyed their first extended outing around the Algarve Circuit and while the likes of Augusto Fernandez and Remy Gardner spent the most time at the top of the timesheets, it was Marcos Ramirez who took the most advantage of the late time attack. The Spaniard finished the morning one hundredth of a second ahead of Fabio Di Giannantonio and compatriot Luca Marini, who was also within a tenth of the lead.

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Valencia Moto2 & Moto3 Review - Neil Morrison On A Moto2 Thriller, Diggia's Downfall, Lowes' Fortitude, And The Vicissitudes Of Airline Seats

Submitted by Neil Morrison on

Joan Mir wrapped up the MotoGP title with a round to go. But the junior classes will go right to the wire after two dramatic encounters at the Valencian Grand Prix. Moto2 produced its best race of the year, Moto3 its biggest winning margin of the year. Here, we look at last weekend’s big talking points in the junior classes.

Chaos reigns in vintage finale

As fun and open as Moto2 has been this year, a race wasn’t decided on the final lap (Jorge Martin’s controversial penalty at the Styrian GP aside) from round 1 to round 13. Here, it would have been hard to conjure up more drama if events had been penned by a Hollywood scriptwriter.

Once European GP winner Marco Bezzecchi hit the front on lap five, it was hard to see a way back from his pursuers. But by Sunday lunchtime the wind had picked up considerably from the morning, making the Moto2 machines nervous and twitchy. “With the wind, I really struggled,” said Bezzecchi. “The bike was very nervous, I had little grip.” This surely played a major part in the nature of the top five: just 0.8s covered first to fifth after 25 laps.

As did Di Giannantonio. He and Bezzecchi had more than a second in hand over the pursuers with five laps remaining. But the Speed Up man’s two moves pushed them wide, allowing the rest back into play. It was a finale to remember.

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Portimao MotoGP Preview: 2020's Final Unexplored Frontier

Submitted by David Emmett on

And so a strange and unexpected season draws to a close. Fifteen rounds of Grand Prix motorcycle racing – fourteen rounds of MotoGP, after the premier class were forced to skip the opening race at Qatar at the very beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic – were far, far more than we expected in the early months of the year. It is a credit to Dorna, the manufacturers, and to the teams that we have made it this far. It hasn't been easy, and it meant squeezing a punishing schedule into a very brief period of time, and limiting the number of tracks and countries MotoGP visited, but in the end, we got our money's worth.

So it is fitting that we end the 2020 MotoGP season at a brand new venue MotoGP has never visited before, the first new track since Buriram joined the calendar in 2018. The Autodromo Internacional do Algarve at Portimao (more correctly spelled Portimão, but like most English speakers, searching for diacritics on my keyboard is so foreign that I cheat by skipping straight to the Anglicized version of the name) is set just inland from the Algarve, Portugal's southern coast, amid a vast swathe of golfing resorts.

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