Photo by Gold & Goose
It was another great performance by MotoGP World Championship leader Marc Marquez Sunday in the Aragon Grand Prix. The young Spaniard thrilled the home crowd overcoming an early-race mistake to charge back and take a commanding victory, eventually pulling away to a 2.740-second victory over the Yamaha pair of Jorge Lorenzo and Valentino Rossi. The win was the fourth of the season for Marquez and pushed his lead in the series to 52 points (248-196) over Rossi. Lorenzo is third with 182 points after round 14 of 18.
American Nicky Hayden continued his improvement in his return to MotoGP in a substitute roll for Estrella Galicia 0,0 Marc VDS Honda. Hayden found decent speed in the race and worked his way into a championship-points paying position in 15th, assuring at least that an American rider would be included in the final championship tally of 2016.
For Marquez it was a brilliant comeback at Motorland Aragon after running off the track on lap three.
“The first lap I attacked because I know that my rhythm was better,” explained Marquez, who scored his 28th-career MotoGP victory. “My target was to try to lead the race full bore and Rossi could follow me, but I did a mistake. When I was leading I nearly lose the front and then I say, ‘OK, stay calm,’ warm-weather front tire because I was with the hard one. And then step by step I get a good rhythm. When I overtake Valentino I pushed two laps and then when I saw that the race was quite enough then I just try to keep the rhythm and I’m very happy, no? Because a lot of races, OK, step by step, but Rossi was gaining a lot of points and now we stopped and this is good.”
It was an intense start with Lorenzo and Marquez running side by side for the first set of turns on the opening lap. While the pair were battling Viñales took advantage and squeezed up on the inside to pass both on the factory Suzuki. Marquez briefly took back the lead, but ran too hot into a turn, giving Viñales an opportunity to get back to the front.
At the end of the second lap Marquez found a way to put his Honda by the hard-charging Suzuki rider. At turn seven Marquez slid his Honda and fell all the way back from first to fifth. That put Viñales ahead once again, with the Yamahas of Lorenzo and Rossi closely following and Dovizioso fourth.
Scott Redding was a faller on the first lap.
Five laps in and Rossi passed his teammate Lorenzo on the brakes into turn one to take over second. Marquez was again mounting a charge, getting by Dovi and breathing down Lorenzo’s neck.
Lap seven saw Marquez pick off Lorenzo to take third. Meanwhile Rossi was turning in the fastest laps and was right on his future teammate Viñales, but once on his rear wheel Rossi found it difficult to find a way around the leader.
At turn four on lap nine Rossi made a brilliant inside move on Viñales to take the lead for the first time. Viñales had to pick up when he realized Rossi had committed to the move. At the start of lap 10 it was Viñales making an error, running too hot into turn one and giving Marquez an easy passage to second. A few turns later and Lorenzo was around Viñales, who looked to be struggling to maintain the intense pace.
Up front the gap was a half-second between Rossi and Marquez with 12 laps to go, but that gap was quickly narrowing.
On lap 13 Marquez took a lunge at in the esses at turn 15 and just squeezed past Rossi for the lead. Rossi fought back, but couldn’t regain the point.
About a second back from the leaders was Lorenzo and Viñales continuing to battle for the final podium spot. Dani Pedrosa ran fifth, holding off a Cal Crutchlow and Aleix Espargaro.
The second half of the race saw Marquez breaking away. Rossi was running second, but the third-place Lorenzo-Viñales battle was closing in. Crutchlow made a move and immediately began putting a gap on Pedrosa and Aleix Espargaro.
Tito Rabat crashed out of 16th while battling teammate Nicky Hayden.
With five laps to go Lorenzo took second from Rossi in turn four. Rossi fought back, but Lorenzo was stronger at this point in the race and was able to hold off Rossi, who continued to battle to get the position back. By now Lorenzo really had little chance to catch Marquez, who was three seconds up the road.
With two laps to go Rossi tried a desperate move in turn 12, but ran well off the track and Lorenzo went back to second. The move cost Rossi three seconds and put second out of reach.
Lorenzo seemed satisfied with second on this day.
“The crash from this morning make me finish second today,” said Lorenzo, who score his best result since winning Mugello back in May. “I crashed in the warm up, so we needed to do two warming laps. I tried the first bike with the hard rear tire and I like it a lot, no? But it was the first time the hard rear tire like me. The soft one did not feel good, so the instinct was to use the hard one, and finally the instinct make me make a good result. So I am very proud. I did the maximum in the race and finally we finished closer than we expected to the winner.”
Rossi was brief in his post-race comments, obviously not happy that he could not stay ahead of his teammate.
“We started with a different setting,” he said. “We tried to be stronger to the end of the race, but at the end I was spinning a lot. Anyway, I think everybody was out on the same boat and it’s a shame because with two laps to go I did a mistake in braking and I have to go wide. If not we can fight for the second place, but anyway the podium is OK.”
October 16 in Motegi, Japan, will host the next round of the series.
GRAN PREMIO MOVISTAR DE ARAGÓN
MotoGP Race Classification
Alcañiz, Spain – Sunday, September 25, 2016
| 1 | 25 | 93 | Marc MARQUEZ | SPA | Repsol Honda Team | Honda | 167.0 | 41’57.678 |
| 2 | 20 | 99 | Jorge LORENZO | SPA | Movistar Yamaha MotoGP | Yamaha | 166.8 | +2.740 |
| 3 | 16 | 46 | Valentino ROSSI | ITA | Movistar Yamaha MotoGP | Yamaha | 166.6 | +5.983 |
| 4 | 13 | 25 | Maverick VIÑALES | SPA | Team SUZUKI ECSTAR | Suzuki | 166.4 | +8.238 |
| 5 | 11 | 35 | Cal CRUTCHLOW | GBR | LCR Honda | Honda | 166.1 | +13.221 |
| 6 | 10 | 26 | Dani PEDROSA | SPA | Repsol Honda Team | Honda | 165.8 | +17.072 |
| 7 | 9 | 41 | Aleix ESPARGARO | SPA | Team SUZUKI ECSTAR | Suzuki | 165.7 | +18.522 |
| 8 | 8 | 44 | Pol ESPARGARO | SPA | Monster Yamaha Tech 3 | Yamaha | 165.7 | +19.432 |
| 9 | 7 | 19 | Alvaro BAUTISTA | SPA | Aprilia Racing Team Gresini | Aprilia | 165.4 | +23.071 |
| 10 | 6 | 6 | Stefan BRADL | GER | Aprilia Racing Team Gresini | Aprilia | 165.1 | +27.898 |
| 11 | 5 | 4 | Andrea DOVIZIOSO | ITA | Ducati Team | Ducati | 164.8 | +32.448 |
| 12 | 4 | 51 | Michele PIRRO | ITA | Ducati Team | Ducati | 164.7 | +35.033 |
| 13 | 3 | 8 | Hector BARBERA | SPA | Avintia Racing | Ducati | 164.6 | +36.224 |
| 14 | 2 | 50 | Eugene LAVERTY | IRL | Pull & Bear Aspar Team | Ducati | 164.5 | +37.621 |
| 15 | 1 | 69 | Nicky HAYDEN | USA | Estrella Galicia 0,0 Marc VDS | Honda | 164.3 | +40.509 |
| 16 | 68 | Yonny HERNANDEZ | COL | Pull & Bear Aspar Team | Ducati | 164.1 | +43.906 | |
| 17 | 9 | Danilo PETRUCCI | ITA | OCTO Pramac Yakhnich | Ducati | 163.3 | +56.740 | |
| 18 | 76 | Loris BAZ | FRA | Avintia Racing | Ducati | 163.1 | +59.681 | |
| 19 | 45 | Scott REDDING | GBR | OCTO Pramac Yakhnich | Ducati | 160.9 | +1’34.126 | |
| Not Classified | ||||||||
| 53 | Tito RABAT | SPA | Estrella Galicia 0,0 Marc VDS | Honda | 164.4 | 7 Laps | ||
