By Kate Adams
Fabio Quartararo came into the weekend hoping for a podium, he left happy. A very strong qualifying saw the Frenchmen lining up in P4, he translated this into a P5 in the Sprint and a P3 in the Grand Prix. We did see the world champion stuck behind Maverick Vinales for a large part of the second half, showing that Yamaha still doesn't have what it needs to be able to overtake.
Factory Aprilia showed strong form from Friday showing serious speed. Both pilots saw themselves on the front row of the grid. Vinales lightly cooked his tires in the first half of the Sprint leading to him missing out on a podium with a P4 finish. He managed better on Sunday with a P2. The biggest mistake in the garage came at the hands of his teammate. In the Grand Prix Aleix Espargaró, against the advice of Michelin he ran the Soft tire leading to a fall through the order on Sunday. He did pick up a P10 but it was more due to the fact this race became a bit of a battle for survival. This poor performance came on the back of a DNF means he would likely want to forget this weekend.
RNF Aprilia had a pointless sprint, as in they didn't score any points, hopefully they collected data to see how they could make steps forward with the bike. Unfortunately they didn't fair much better in the Grand Prix with Miguel continuing his luckless streak after contact from Brad Binder left the bike damaged. He did pick up a p12 with teammate Raul Fernandez finishing in P13
Over at Pramac Ducati fellow world championship contender Jorge Martin crashed in Q2 leading him to end up starting from P6 on the grid. He really covered well on a Saturday with an impressive recovery to win the race and take the championship lead. In the Grand Prix Martin binned it on turn 11 after collecting some dirt. Crashing out of a 3 second lead and gifting Pecco an opportunity.
Pecco Bagnaia seized that opportunity with a ride showing why he is the current world champion. He came from 13th on the grid to win the Grand Prix on Sunday reclaiming the championship lead he lost the day prior. Factory Ducati had seen some in house drama earlier in the weekend when returning rider Enea Bastianini put on a strong Q1 performance saw him knock world championship contender Pecco Bagnaia out of Q2 by progressing himself leading to some very sour faces in that garage. Bastianini put on a strong ride himself on Sunday after he had dropped back to p20, finishing in p8.
VR46 Ducati saw both pilots coming into this weekend recovering from Broken collarbones. Marco Bezzecchi only underwent surgery earlier in the week, he then went on to put on a strong performance. The Italian started from P9 after a Q2 crash he managed a sensational Sprint showing with a podium performance securing him P3 and P5 in the weekends races keeping him on the edge of the championship fight. Teammate Luca Marini went through Q1 to put on a blistering performance and put it on pole. He followed this with a P2 in the Sprint, Marini was on the wrong side of Binders bumpy weekend and did crash out. He did remount to serve his long lap penalty
Gresini Ducati saw Alex Marquez crash on Friday ruling him out for the rest of the weekend as he recovers from 4 broken ribs.
Factory Hondas race ended with both pilots in the gravel, but the real story at Honda came from their satalite team LCR Honda. Alex Rins returned from his injury, he missed a bunch of sessions due to his broken leg and this weekend it was clear he was still in pain but he stuck it out and pulled off a brilliant race finishing in p9. Major props to Alex Rins for this.
Opmerkingen