Bike India – August 2019

MotoGPResult

Pos. RIdeR TImIng

1 marcMARQUEZ 40’31.175

2 FabioQUARTARARO +2.660

3 daniloPETRUCCI +4.537

4 AlexRINS +6.602

5 JackMILLER +6.870

C

atalunya is one of the tough

races on the calendar. The track

itself is demanding on the tyres

and riders. But it is indeed a place of

many a showdown and never fails to

throw in exciting Grand Prix racing. This

year strictly kept to tradition and gave us

nail-biting action across all classes.

MotoGP

At the race start, it was Andrea Dovizioso

of the Mission Winnow Ducati factory

team that led, followed by Maverick

Viñales of the Monster Energy Yamaha

MotoGP team and Repsol Honda’s

world champion, Marc Marquez, in

third. Danilo Petrucci on the other

factory Ducati and Valentino Rossi on

the other Monster Energy Yamaha

MotoGP kept on the tail of the front

three. But there was a surprise that came

in the form of a rampaging Jorge Lorenzo

and his Repsol Honda who seemed to

be riding the race possessed. The racing

was fierce and Lorenzo and Viñales

seemed to be on a proper mission.

Marquez by now had passed Viñales to

take second but the Yamaha man was

taking none of it. He poked and prodded

Fabio Quartararo on the Petronas Yamaha SRT and these three

were in a proper fight with one another. This fight, however,

caused the Pramac Racing rider Jack Miller and Cal Crutchlow

on the LCR Honda Castrol to join the group, with the second

Suzuki of Joan Mir trailing a short distance away. Rins made an

impatient mistake and went well wide, re-joining at the back of

the group and now in a scuffle with his teammate.

The race for second continued and was among the remaining

four: Petrucci, Quartararo, Miller, and Crutchlow. Quartararo

makes a move on Petrucci and made it stick. Following suit soon

after Crutchlow made a move on Miller, but he went in too hot

into the corner and ended up in the gravel. Marquez, on the other

hand, continued to set the fastest lap-times. In the end, it was

Marquez for the win, followed by Quartararo a brilliant new

talent and Petrucci rounding off the podium places.

at the opening, making the race a true

spectacle. Similarly, the superfast

Lorenzo by now had passes Danilo

Petrucci and Valentino Rossi and was

sitting in fourth, mere inches away from

the front three. Then came an incident

that had fans of the sport talking about

for weeks. This incident was two

simultaneous moves on the same corner.

One was Marquez on Dovizioso and the

other was Lorenzo on Viñales. The latter

saw Lorenzo lose his front wheel and

wipe out three riders. These were

Dovizioso, Viñales, and Rossi, apart

from Lorenzo himself. Safe to say that he

is no longer on their Christmas list.

Marquez was now free to ride to

victory as the next closest rider was a fair

bit behind the Spaniard. The race for

second now was between Petrucci, Team

Suzuki Ecstar Alex Rins, and pole-setter

Petrucci and Rins fight

it out for third place

marquez’s ridiculous

lean angles

116 Bike India August 2019 http://www.bikeindia.in