The MotoGP World Championship has entered its second half, but 10 full weekends and 11 Sprints have not been enough to create a gap between the main title candidates. Success in the short race at the Red Bull Ring, his third on Saturday of the season, has allowed Pecco Bagnaia to join Jorge Martin at the top of the championship standings.
The main title contenders put on a great show in the first two laps, overtaking each other several times after a spectacular start by the reigning world champion. It’s a shame that in the end the race was decided by a penalty given to “Martinator”, because the feeling was that there could have been some great things to see until the checkered flag.
On the second lap, however, the rider from Madrid forced the braking at the entrance to the 2A-2B chicane, ending up long in the escape route. In that case, the regulation requires not only that the rider must give up his position, but that he must lose at least one second compared to his usual times. Something that Martin was unable to do, who therefore first ended up under investigation and then was sanctioned with a long lap penalty, which dropped him to third place, leaving Bagnaia alone in the lead with just under two seconds over Marc Marquez.
At this point it seemed like a pretty consolidated race, but it was Marquez who threw things into disarray, as during the tenth of the 14 scheduled laps he had a slide at turn 3 that knocked him out. Martin was therefore able to take advantage of this to regain second place and limit the damage, even though he could do nothing but watch Bagnaia fly alone towards victory, wiping out his lead in the standings. If nothing else, today he was certain that the stitches he received on his left thumb after a domestic accident do not seem to be a problem, because his pace was really very good.
Also taking advantage of Marquez’s stumble, which dropped him to over 70 points from the top of the World Championship, was Aleix Espargaro, who with the lowest step of the podium took home a result that was most likely unexpected for him and for Aprilia on a circuit that is usually difficult for the RS-GP. The Granollers rider’s performance was really good, however, because he rode the entire race alone, keeping the chasing group at a distance of over two seconds.
The second group was ultimately led by Enea Bastianini, who managed to patch up a rather complicated weekend up to now, even if his gap in the standings now rises again to 52 points, but above all today he reiterated that he does not have the possibility of keeping up with the two riders ahead of him on this track.
To take fourth place, “The Beast” also gave Franco Morbidelli a fairing at turn 1 in the finale, with his compatriot eventually placing sixth, bowing to a Jack Miller who, as in qualifying, confirmed himself as the best among the KTM riders. The points zone is then completed with the other two RC16s of Brad Binder and the wild card Pol Espargaro, who has the most advanced version, interspersed with the Ducati GP23 of Marco Bezzecchi, who climbed up in the second part of the race after a decidedly lackluster start.
You have to go down to 12th place instead to find the first of the Japanese bikes, which is Fabio Quartararo’s Yamaha. This time too, “El Diablo”, who crossed the finish line behind Pedro Acosta and Maverick Vinales, both a little below expectations, found himself almost 18 seconds behind the winner. The Hondas were further behind, led by Johann Zarco in 15th place, ahead of Takaaki Nakagami and Luca Marini. Checkered flag also for Aprilia test rider Lorenzo Savadori, who finished in 18th place with his “laboratory” RS-GP on which he is already testing some solutions with a view to 2025.
#MotoGP #Bagnaia #triumphs #Sprint #Austria #joins #penalised #Martin
