Submitted by Jared Earle on
After a reorganised grid, with the shenanigans of qualifying sorted out, would the shuffle affect the race result?
Karel Hanika led Efren Vazquez into the first corner as Fabian Quartararo wasted his front row start, falling back to seventh place. Danny Kent, dominant throughout qualifying, took until turn twelve of the first lap to get to the front.
On the second lap, Kent and his teammate Vazquez led but Enea Bastianini and Brad Binder both led at one point, trying to break Kent's rhythm and keep him from matching his qualifying pace, but Kent passed Bastianini before the lap finished and he set about building a gap.
Mid way through the third lap, Kent had a half second gap over Vazquez and the two were visibly quicker than the rest of the pack and on the fifth lap, when Kent's tyres came to him, the pair cleared off. On the seventh lap, Kent and Vazquez had over two seconds between them and the chasing battle of seven riders fighting for third.
Kent settled into his own pace, leaving Vazquez in a lonely second place while Brad Binder, Niccolò Antonelli, Enea Bastianini and the rest of the first pack were eventually joined by the second pack, making the battle for third stretch all the way back to thirteenth place.
Roman Fenati clawed his way from that second group to scrap for third place with Antonelli and Bastianini and led into the last corner but over-braked on the last corner of the last lap, giving Bastianini the momentum to pass him by the finish line.
Danny Kent won a measured race with over seven seconds between him and his teammate Efren Vazquez in second. Enea Bastianini took third place a further two seconds behind.
Kent now leads the championship by 66 points from Bastianini at the halfway mark of the series, nine races of eighteen done.
Results:
Pos. | Num. | Rider | Bike | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 52 | Danny KENT | Honda | 39'29.359 |
2 | 7 | Efren VAZQUEZ | Honda | +7.554 |
3 | 33 | Enea BASTIANINI | Honda | +9.603 |
4 | 5 | Romano FENATI | KTM | +9.629 |
5 | 23 | Niccolò ANTONELLI | Honda | +9.664 |
6 | 9 | Jorge NAVARRO | Honda | +9.807 |
7 | 41 | Brad BINDER | KTM | +9.837 |
8 | 10 | Alexis MASBOU | Honda | +10.266 |
9 | 55 | Andrea LOCATELLI | Honda | +10.352 |
10 | 31 | Niklas AJO | KTM | +11.558 |
11 | 65 | Philipp OETTL | KTM | +11.777 |
12 | 88 | Jorge MARTIN | Mahindra | +18.416 |
13 | 98 | Karel HANIKA | KTM | +18.426 |
14 | 84 | Jakub KORNFEIL | KTM | +28.782 |
15 | 95 | Jules DANILO | Honda | +28.892 |
16 | 11 | Livio LOI | Honda | +28.958 |
17 | 17 | John MCPHEE | Honda | +29.218 |
18 | 32 | Isaac VIÑALES | Husqvarna | +29.478 |
19 | 63 | Zulfahmi KHAIRUDDIN | KTM | +29.750 |
20 | 40 | Darryn BINDER | Mahindra | +45.844 |
21 | 16 | Andrea MIGNO | KTM | +46.658 |
22 | 29 | Stefano MANZI | Mahindra | +46.780 |
23 | 2 | Remy GARDNER | Mahindra | +46.840 |
24 | 19 | Alessandro TONUCCI | Mahindra | +46.965 |
25 | 12 | Matteo FERRARI | Mahindra | +47.339 |
26 | 91 | Gabriel RODRIGO | KTM | +1'06.125 |
27 | 45 | Jonas GEITNER | KTM | +1'24.437 |
Not Classified | ||||
22 | Ana CARRASCO | KTM | 4 Laps | |
6 | Maria HERRERA | Husqvarna | 4 Laps | |
24 | Tatsuki SUZUKI | Mahindra | 7 Laps | |
97 | Maximilian KAPPLER | FTR Honda | 15 Laps | |
20 | Fabio QUARTARARO | Honda | 22 Laps | |
21 | Francesco BAGNAIA | Mahindra | 22 Laps | |
76 | Hiroki ONO | Honda | 26 Laps |
Comments
Unique crash
That must be a first, two women crashing together in a GP race... And a nasty crash it was, with Ana Carrasco's front wheel hitting Maria Herrera in the lower back. Not that Ana could do anything about it, she had nowhere to go. I hope both ladies are physically OK. Especially Herrera seems to have some real potential (she was unlucky to be knocked off in Assen, being well into the points at that time), but also Carrasco has had some really good races in previous seasons.
Very likely
Good point; I would be very surprised if it weren't a first.