MotoGP Race And Practice Results

After a relatively carefree Moto3 session, MotoGP practice was off to a sketchy start. Barcelona winner Andrea Dovizioso ran out of luck early in the session, his Ducati smoking away and leaving a trace of oil in its wake on the outlap. The failure claimed its first victim in Dovizioso’s teammate, Jorge Lorenzo, the Spaniard sliding out in turn nine.

Jonas Folger was even less lucky, the Tech 3 rider limping his way to the Medical Centre after a fast crash in turn eleven just seconds before Lorenzo. The red flag was waved only three minutes into the session, for the clean-up operation to take place. That gave some extra time to the Marc VDS team to sort out the front brake issue that stopped Jack Miller from even leaving the pitlane.

After a significant delay, all the riders were able to get out and give it another try. Marc Marquez, Alvaro Bautista and Dani Pedrosa were the trio that led the first part of the session, the three Spaniards running tightly together on track.

With the rain always being a concern in Assen, the final ten minutes saw a bit of a windy shootout to ensure top ten positions. Danilo Petrucci had an interesting morning, the Italian ending the session in top position but having a mechanical problem on the final lap, adding to Ducati’s worries.

Johann Zarco made some of his usual magic on soft tyres, the Frenchman going second, narrowly ahead of Cal Crutchlow, the British rider being top Honda in the session. After his early adventures, Andrea Dovizioso had a good shot at top spot before getting slowed down by traffic and having to settle for fourth position.

Valentino Rossi had one of his usual sessions, apparently struggling outside of the top ten before making the jump to fifth. He was followed closely by the Suzuki of Andrea Iannone, Dani Pedrosa a place further back in seventh spot.

Folger was deemed fit to rejoin the action, taking it easy in the beginning, but that didn’t last long, the Tech 3 rider as high as second in the final ten minutes and dropping back to eighth eventually. After the crash and an issue with engine breaking, Lorenzo took his time to climb up the timesheets and made it as high as ninth position. The top ten was completed by Karel Abraham, only half a second down on the leader.

Maverick Vinales’ run on the soft tyre combination was good enough to hand him top position midway through the session, but the championship leader did not put on new tyres for the shootout, opting to give the softs a good long run to test their potential for the race. That dropped him back to twelfth place, two hundredths of a second in front of Marquez.

Alex Rins made his comeback from injury with an eighteenth position, a second down on Petrucci.

Results:

As with all Sunday races this year, the front three grid places are based on where riders finished in the Saturday race. Twenty laps of Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli under a clear Italian sky. In spite of a tyre acting unusually yesterday, everyone was on the SC0 Pirelli rear. Chaz Davies would not start the race due to his crash yesterday. 

Jordi Torres in pole position was unable to get the BMW off the line perfectly, but he got a better start than usual. It wasn’t as good as Xavi Fores’s start from second place however, and Fores put the Ducati into the lead. Eugene Laverty from third on the grid held off Tom Sykes and Jonathan Rea for a few corners but the Kawasakis both powered past him and a lap later, Marco Melandri stuck his Ducati in front of Laverty’s Aprilia. On lap four, the front five bikes of Fores, Torres, Sykes, Rea and Melandri were breaking away from Laverty, Randy Krummenacher, Lorenzo Savadori, Alex Lowes and race one’s part-way leader Michael van der Mark.

Toward the end of the fifth lap, Jordi Torres made a perfect pass into turn twelve to take the lead taking over at the front of the group of five bikes and a lap later, Marco Melandri pushed Rea to the back of the group, taking fourth place from the Kawasaki. Xavi Fores, having lost first place, suffered a second ignominy as his Ducati broke down, ending his weekend. The group of five bikes at the front were now a group of four bikes but they were still almost two seconds clear of Eugene Laverty who was sitting in a lonely fifth place.

Eugene Laverty wouldn’t be lonely for long, as the Yamahas of Alex Lowes and Michael van der Mark were on the move.

On lap seven, Tom Sykes was looking for a way past his former teammate Jordi Torres to take the lead, but as he nearly ran into the back of him, he lost his line and Marco Melandri wasted no time in getting past. On lap ten, as Eugene Laverty, Alex Lowes and Michael van der Mark fought each other for fifth place, Melandri passed Torres for the lead but the BMW man had a tighter line coming out of the turn and took it right back off him. As Jonathan Rea tried to pass his teammate Tom Sykes, the two gave Torres and Melandri a bit of breathing room, but when they settled down, they were able to catch them right back up.

Past half race distance, Jordi Torres was taking fast sweeping yet defensive lines while Marco Melandri was taking sharp, tight lines as he tried to probe for a way to the front of the race. At turn eight of lap thirteen, he found one and made it stick, with Torres unable to find a riposte. Two laps later, at the end of the start/finish straight, Jonathan Rea took an outside line past Tom Sykes, round the right-handed turn one, claiming the apex of the left-handed turn two and leading out of the right-handed turn three, finally taking third place only to be staring at a one second gap to the leading duo of Melandri and Torres. A lap later and he had closed the gap, dropping off Sykes behind him.

On lap eighteen, Jordi Torres took a corner with his hand up, his BMW suffering a breakdown. As he carefully got off the track, letting the Kawasakis if Rea and Sykes streak past him, before gesticulating at his bike, appearing to both berate it and plead with it before parking up out of the race. Gone was the chance for the reverse grid to finally make a difference to a race.

Marco Melandri maintained over two seconds from Jonathan Rea and Tom Sykes as the front three riders rode three parade laps to the flag, Melandri taking his first victory since his return to World Superbikes and claiming the 100th Italian victory of the series, adding cream and cherries by doing it in Italy on an Italian bike. Only twelve riders completed the race.

Jonathan Rea heads into the summer break with a fifty point lead in the championship over his teammate Tom Sykes, with Chaz Davies a further sixty one points behind in third place. Race winner Marco Melandri takes fourth place back from Alex Lowes who crashed out, losing the front halfway through the race.

Chaz Davies will be trying to be back on his Ducati at Laguna Seca, according to his team, but it remains to be seen if they’ll attach any weird carbon crockery to his rear wheel that weekend.

Results:

Superpole one, contested by twenty three riders vying for the top two spots, was red flagged with ten minutes to go after a couple of crashes.

Loris Cresson and Hannes Soomer led before the red flag but the session ended with Kyle Smith and Sheridan Morais getting promoted to Superpole two.

After one lap of Superpole two, Kenan Sofuoglu was quickest ahead of Lucas Mahias with a 1’39.403 but a lap later, after his time was beaten by Christian Gamarino and Federico Caricasulo, Sofuoglu took the top spot back with a 1’38.897, the first 1’38 lap of the weekend.

After a tyre change for a tea break, Luke Stapleford was first back out, putting himself into fifth place before everyone else returned to the track. Kenan Sofuoglu increased his lead at the top, posting a 1’38.672 and turning everyone else’s potential first place laps into potential second place laps. Federico Caricasulo held second place briefly until Jules Cluzel slipstreamed Kyle Smith along the straight to take second place from him and get within a tenth of a second of Sofuoglu.

Third-placed Federico Caricasulo tucked in behind his teammate Lucas Mahias to steal his clean air in an attempt to gain a place, but all he did was keep Mahias back in fourth place, much to the Frenchman’s annoyance.

Kenan Sofuoglu takes pole position ahead of his old rival Jules Cluzel and Federico Caricasulo with championship leader Lucas Mahias heading the second row next to Christian Gamarino, in spite of a late crash, and Luke Stapleford.

Qualifying Results:

Superpole One Results:

Superpole Two Results:

Superpole one took place on a warm morning. Eleven riders competed for two places with Lorenzo Savadori and Randy Krummenacher in the top two spots.

Roman Ramos recorded the first timed lap, a 1’36.048, and he remained on top after everyone completed their first lap, although Lorenzo Savadori was within five hundredths of his time. A lap later, Savadori, Raffaele De Rosa and Randy Krummenacher all beat Ramos’s time with Savadori setting a 1’35.708 in top place and every popped back to their garages for new tyres and a blether.

Stefan Bradl was first out, joined quickly by everyone apart from Lorenzo Savadori whose bike was still being fettled in its garage. As Savadori finally made it out, Randy Krummenacher had taken over at the top with a 1’35.701 only to be knocked down a spot by Roman Ramos, over a quarter of a second quicker.

As the flag came out, Savadori hadn’t improved his time and nobody else was on a competitive pace. Roman Ramos, with a 1’35.437, and Randy Krummenacher were promoted to Superpole two and a chance to improve their positions further. Lorenzo Savadori headed the fifth row in thirteenth place.

The top twelve riders, including the two from the first session, took to the track five minutes later. Chaz Davies didn’t have the lenticular wheel cover, an ugly shallow aerodynamic bowl fitted over the rear wheel, he used in this morning’s untimed session.

Jonathan Rea, fresh from getting an MBE in the Queen’s birthday honours list, was first out on track, as is normal, and he was unsurprisingly followed by Eugene Laverty. Rea set a 1’34.405 on the first lap with Tom Sykes just over a quarter of a second outside with Marco Melandri over half a second off Rea’s pace in third. As Rea slowed after one lap, pitting in, Sykes spent another lap to get within two tenths of Rea’s provisional pole lap. Davies pushed Melandri off the front row and joined everyone else in the pits to get a qualifying tyre.

Chaz Davies fitted the carbon wok to his rear wheel along with the Q tyre adding to his unsprung weight but hopefully aiding him in aerodynamics.

Leon Camier went third quickest with the first lap set on a qualifying tyre, but as the faster men started spending their rubber, Marco Melandri took the top spot until Jonathan Rea set a 1’33.990, smashing the lap record and holding it for under a minute as Tom Sykes lopped three tenths of a second off Rea’s time and took his fortieth pole position with a 1’33.662.

Tom Sykes, Jonathan Rea and Marco Melandri made up the front row with Chaz Davies taking his birdbath-wheeled Ducati to fourth place ahead of Michael van der Mark and Leon Camier.

Qualifying Results:

Superpole One Results:

Superpole Two Results: