Arbolino wins with a red flag in Moto2 and Augusto Fernández retains the lead
Izan Guevara will have his first ‘match ball’ for the Moto3 title in Australia
MADRID, 2 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Portuguese Miguel Oliveira (Ducati) won this Sunday in the MotoGP race of the Thai Grand Prix, the sixteenth round of the Motorcycle World Championship, while the Italian Tony Arbolino (Kalex) won a Moto2 race stopped early due to the rain and the Spanish Izan Guevara (GasGas) will have his first ‘match ball’ for the Moto3 title in Australia after an appointment in which Sergio García Dols (GasGas) went to the ground and was won by the Italian Dennis Foggia (Honda) .
The chaos due to the rain in Buriram, which returned to the championship after two cancellations due to the pandemic, leaves the first three riders in the premier class in just 20 points, with Frenchman Fabio Quartararo (Yamaha) still leading but harassed by the push of his main adversaries.
The one from Nice, who came to amass 91 points ahead of the second and now has 219, could only be seventeenth and did not add up on the Thai track, where the Italian Francesco ‘Pecco’ Bagnaia (Ducati) took advantage of orders from team at Ducati to get on the podium and stay just two units behind ‘El Diablo’.
Aleix Espargaró (Aprilia) also took a breath; The one from Granollers won five valuable points by finishing eleventh and continues to aspire to the title, 20 points behind Quartararo. All in the absence of three Grand Prix for the resolution of the championship: Australia, Malaysia and Valencia.
The tension was felt on the starting grid, where Aleix Espargaró unsuccessfully tried to convince his teammates and Race Direction that the race could not be held due to poor visibility between turns 3 and 4. “I don’t know sees nothing, you can’t run,” he exclaimed.
However, everything started an hour late and with the Italian Marco Bezzecchi (Ducati) defending his pole position; a sanction for the transalpine for exceeding the limits of the track left Australian Jack Miller (Ducati) in the lead in the second lap.
Aleix was also burdened shortly after with a ‘long lap’ for irresponsible driving by throwing South African Brad Binder (KTM) off the track, and fell to fourteenth place.
On lap 15, Portugal’s Miguel Oliveira (KTM) took command of the race as the track dried up, and Marc Márquez (Repsol Honda), fourth, was battling for a podium position with Francesco Bagnaia (Ducati).
The Frenchman Johann Zarco (Ducati) got in the middle of both and threatened to snatch the third position from ‘Pecco’, but the team orders came into play. Thus, Bagnaia was able to complete a podium led by Oliveira, with his second victory of the course, and in which Miller was second.
Marc Márquez was finally fifth, while Maverick Viñales (Aprilia) finished seventh, ahead of Alex Márquez (Honda) and Jorge Martín (Ducati). Alex Rins (Suzuki) finished thirteenth, Pol Espargaró (Repsol Honda) fourteenth and Raúl Fernández (KTM), fifteenth.
ARBOLINO QUEEN IN MOTO2 CHAOS
For his part, the Italian Tony Arbolino (Kalex) took the victory in a race that could not be completed due to a double red flag caused by the rain. The Czech Filip Salac (Kalex) and the Spanish Arón Canet (Kalex) completed a podium finish in a test that was reduced from 24 to 16 laps, then to five laps and was finally cancelled.
Initially, the race was declared wet, but the water that flooded the Chang International Circuit made the track impassable. The action was stopped to resume after five laps, although the rain did not let up and the second red flag forced everything to be interrupted, dividing the points in half.
The leader of the intermediate category, Augusto Fernández (Kalex), guaranteed himself a seventh place that keeps him with a point and a half advantage over the Japanese Ai Ogura (Kalex), sixth this Sunday. Canet continues third overall.
In addition, Alonso López (Boscoscuro) was fifth, and Albert Arenas (Kalex), fourteenth, also entered the points. Pedro Acosta (Kalex) finished sixteenth, Jorge Navarro (Kalex) twentieth, Marcos Ramírez (MV Augusta) twenty-third and Manu González (Kalex) twenty-fifth. Jeremy Alcoba (Kalex) and Fermín Aldeguer (Boscoscuro) did not finish.
GUEVARA WILL HAVE ‘MATCH BALL’ IN AUSTRALIA
In Moto3, the Italian Dennis Foggia (Honda) was proclaimed the winner in Buriram in a meeting in which Izan Guevara (GasGas), who finished in fifth position, was one step away from the title of the small category after the fall of his teammate and main rival, Sergio García Dols (GasGas).
With 265 points, the Spaniard leads Foggia by 49 and Burriana by 56, all with 75 points still up for grabs; thus, he will be crowned champion if he is able to get two more points than the Italian and maintain his lead over García Dols in the Australian event.
All after a race in which Foggia, poleman on Saturday, reigned from start to finish to lead a podium in which he was accompanied by the Japanese Ayumu Sasaki (Husqvarna) and the also transalpine Riccardo Rossi (Honda).
A crash by Adrián Fernández (KTM) at turn 12 during the first lap hampered the race for the man from Castellón, who, although he returned to the track, had to retire on the eighth lap. Among the rest of the Spaniards, Jaume Masià (KTM) was eighth, ahead of David Muñoz (KTM), Dani Holgado (KTM) eleventh, Carlos Tatay (CFMoto) thirteenth, Xavi Artigas (CFMoto) fourteenth, Vicente Pérez (Honda) nineteenth , Iván Ortolá (KTM) twentieth and Ana Carrasco (KTM) twenty-second.