It was clear enough that Enea Bastianini was finding himself again, but the Ducati rider was still missing the high point in this 2024 MotoGP. However, the rider from Rimini came out in style on Saturday at the British Grand Prix, taking his first win in a Sprint at Silverstone.
Up to now, “The Beast” had always lacked something in qualifying to compete on equal terms with the best and this time, starting from the front row, he immediately hit the mark. Among other things, with his success he managed to perfectly fill the role of squire for his teammate Pecco Bagnaia, who slipped today, preserving his world championship leadership.
At the start, it was the Sprint specialist, Jorge Martin from Madrid, who took command of operations. The Prima Pramac Racing rider got off to a great start from the second row and in the space of a few corners took the lead, followed by Bastianini, poleman Aleix Espargaro and a Bagnaia who seemed a bit awkward in the early stages, after a good start.
The leading quartet immediately imposed a pace that was difficult for the rest of the group to maintain, but on the fifth lap the first big twist arrived: in an attempt to close in on Espargaro’s Aprilia, Bagnaia overdid it when braking at turn 4, losing the front and ending his race prematurely in the escape road.
At this point, Martin found himself virtually the leader of the world standings with two lengths on Pecco, but he had not yet taken into account Bastianini. In fact, on the sixth lap, Enea tried a first attack at Copse, but suffered the cross of “Martinator”. However, the vice-world champion could do nothing when the Romagnola re-entered at Stowe, finding a practically perfect overtaking.
For a couple of laps, Martin tried to stay glued to the other Desmosedici GP, but then probably the memory of the sensational mistake at Sachsenring urged him to stay out of trouble. Also because in the meantime Bastianini managed to open a gap of almost a second, demonstrating that he deserved the victory and third place in the World Championship at -55. With the second place instead Martin has reduced the gap to Bagnaia to just one point.
Completing the podium was Espargaro’s Aprilia, who was a bit of a spectator to the battle between the top two, probably having also been penalised a bit by the choice of the hard tyre on the front, unlike the two Ducati riders who instead fitted a medium.
Bagnaia’s was not the only illustrious retirement, because in the final stages Marc Marquez also ended up with his wheels in the air, who was managing a solitary fourth place. With this mistake, the Gresini Racing rider saw himself overtaken by Bastianini in the world championship standings, but above all he wasted a good opportunity to close the gap on Bagnaia.
Brad Binder inherited fourth place, beating Pedro Acosta in a heated KTM family battle that included a contact that saw a winglet fly off the Spanish rookie. Behind them were Alex Marquez’s Ducati Gresini, Jack Miller’s other KTM, Maverick Vinales’ Aprilia and Fabio Di Giannantonio’s Ducati VR46, who scored points despite a long lap penalty for violating track limits.
The first of the Japanese bikes was Fabio Quartararo’s Yamaha, only 11th at the finish line, 15″ behind. Luca Marini instead played for the title of best Honda with Johann Zarco, finishing 15th, just under half a second behind the Frenchman from Team LCR.
Unfortunately, at the start there was a bad accident between Franco Morbidelli and Marco Bezzecchi, with the Prima Pramac Racing rider arriving very long in braking, hitting his innocent compatriot. Both were always conscious, but the Pertamina Enduro VR46 rider is in a lot of pain in one foot, even if the first tests carried out at the medical center have excluded the presence of fractures.
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