Category: Moto2

This weekend the 2018 Moto2 World Championship heads to Barcelona and the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya for round seven of the season, with Pecco Bagnaia leading the championship from Miguel Oliveira and Lorenzo Baldassarri. Major changes have occurred in Montmelo since the World Championship was last there: firstly, the entire circuit has been resurfaced after riders claimed that they would be unable to return to Barcelona last year when the track was in a terrible condition – fortunately the new surface offers plenty of grip. Secondly, for the first time since Luis Salom’s fatal crash in 2016, the World Championship will be using the original layout, with the two high speed right-handers to end the lap. Adaptations have been made to the track in the corner which Salom crashed (was turn twelve, now thirteen), the whole corner has been widened, as has the run-off area, which has also been given a healthy coating of gravel to satisfy safety demands. However, the old turn ten will still be unused, because of the issue with run-off on the exit of that corner which is unavoidable thanks to the F1 chicane that has been used by all MotoGP classes for the last two years, so the tighter turn ten will be used, meaning the left flick at turn eleven will also be used, so for the first time the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya will consist of fourteen corners.

Coming into this round, Miguel Oliveira will be hoping to continue his winning form after picking up his first victory of the season last time out in Mugello to break the Italian domination of the intermediate class so far in 2018. Miguel last won in Mugello in 2015, a win which launched his championship challenge after a difficult start to the season. Pecco Bagnaia is unlikely to buckle in the way that Danny Kent did in the second half of 2015, but in turn Miguel is much closer to Bagnaia in the championship than he was to Kent back in the Brit’s World Championship year and as has been said many times since 2015, when Oliveira starts winning it is hard to stop him – the last part of 2017 is testament to that.

But Oliveira could have a tough job to beat Alex Marquez, who won in Barcelona in superb style last season, beating Tom Luthi by 4.452 seconds and 5.322 ahead of Oliveira. It has not been the start to the season that Marquez would have been hoping for: no wins and only three podiums, in Qatar, Texas and Le Mans. Furthermore, Alex has started to be shown up by his rookie teammate, Joan Mir, who took his first podium in Le Mans and took another in Mugello last time out where he beat Marquez by 3.203 seconds. Tyre wear seems to have been the major issue for Marquez this year, losing out in the final stages in the battle with Bagnaia in Austin, as well as in Le Mans, and in Mugello he fell away in the final five laps also. If he wants to win this weekend he is going to have to address this issue.

And that is assuming that he has the speed to go with the tyre longevity. Particularly, whether Marquez has the speed to beat his teammate. Joan Mir has made huge progress in the first six rounds of the 2018 season, his 2019-2020 MotoGP deal with Suzuki is testament to that, and the next step for him is to take his first intermediate class victory. Mir was victorious in the Barcelona Moto3 race last season, a win which included a tough move on Jorge Martin in the entrance to the chicane section of last year’s layout. A repeat of his Moto3 result of last season would propel the rookie into genuine championship contention, and would also be a huge worry for anyone trying to beat him to that title.

“Anyone”, such as Francesco Bagnaia. The Italian has been sublime this season, with only a ninth in Argentina providing any blots on his copy book. He may have missed the podium last season and, whilst that was not ideal with Oliveira winning, it was important points for the championship fight which looks as though it could go all the way to Valencia with so many riders involved in the scrap. Furthermore, Bagnaia was one of the two fastest riders on the track in the last five laps of the Mugello race, only Mir able to match his pace. Being faster than the KTM of Oliveira in the final laps with the conditions how they were in Italy was very impressive, and positive for the future. Unfortunately, it was not a great weekend for Bagnaia last year in Barcelona, when he finished over twenty seconds away from the win in thirteenth place. He will, not just want, but need more than that this season. This weekend, Bagnaia needs to be on the podium; he needs to stabilise the championship.

Bagnaia’s fellow VR46 Academy rider and flatmate, Lorenzo Baldassarri, could really do with another win this weekend if he is to be back in genuine championship contention. Of all the contenders, including the rookie Mir, Baldassarri is the one with the biggest question mark over his head – you just do not know what he is going to do. For example, he could be dominant like in Jerez, or maybe he will struggle to be in the top ten like in Austin. Realistically, Balda should have won in Mugello, but a mistake on the exit of Borgo San Lorenzo on the final lap gave Oliveira the only chance he needed to take victory away from the number 7. Perhaps that disappointment will fuel Lorenzo’s charge to the podium or maybe even the victory this weekend, similarly to how the eagerness to bounce back from a difficult Austin round led to his dominance in the Spanish Grand Prix.

In injury news, Remy Gardner is back this weekend after his motocross crash before Jerez in which he broke both legs. However, it is uncertain whether Gardner will be able to complete the weekend, so don’t be surprised to see Hector Garzo once again hanging around the Tech3 garage this weekend. Last weekend, Garzo finished fourth and seventh in the two European Moto2 World Championship races in Montmelo, so he is in tune with the track and at a decent speed – he is ready to come in if he needs to.

Featured image courtesy of Gold & Goose/Red Bull Content Pool

Qualifying for the 2018 French Moto2 Grand Prix was decided fairly early on. Well, pole was, at least. Pecco Bagnaia, the championship leader, set the eventual pole time early on in the session to take his first ever Moto2 pole position ahead of tomorrow’s race, in which he will hope to take his fourth podium of the season, and third win from the opening five races.

But it will not be easy, with Xavi Vierge and going with him off the front row. Vierge is looking for his first Grand Prix win, and is fresh from pushing Bagnaia all the way in Jerez for the final podium position. Whilst for Baldassarri, he is coming from a dominant win in Spain, where he waltzed away from the pack to take his and Pons HP40’s first win since 2016. Balda does not have the same pace advantage as he has in Le Mans, but he proved there that he can hang on to a tyre extremely well, and that could prove important in what could be the hottest temperatures of the weekend.

Joan Mir was third for much of the session, before Baldassarri displaced him at the end. His pace in Jerez was masked by a stomach bug. It is not a difficult conclusion to arrive at that Mir could have fought for the podium in Spain had it not been for his illness, and this weekend he is proving that. Remember, also, that Mir ran away with the 2017 Moto3 race in Le Mans, so a first Moto2 podium, maybe victory, is definitely on the cards for tomorrow. Such a result would only strengthen rumours of a move to MotoGP with Honda next season.
Marcel Schrotter and Alex Marquez will join Mir on the second row, and tomorrow’s race will be crucial for Marquez, whose championship hopes took a blow in Jerez when he crashed out of podium contention. He will be hoping to make up for that tomorrow.

Sam Lowes was the top KTM rider in qualifying, despite a crash, attained seventh place, ahead of the factory KTM of Brad Binder and the Kalex of Simone Corsi who join him on the third row. KTMs in seventh and eighth suggests that they have not found solutions to the issues they faced in Le Mans last year, and tomorrow looks like it could be a bit of a struggle for them.

Even more so, with Miguel Oliveira in tenth. The Portuguese will need another strong comeback ride tomorrow if he is not to concede too much ground in the championship. Mattia Pasini, another disappointing qualifier, will start with Oliveira alongside Romano Fenati on row four.

Hector Barbera had his best qualifying of the season in thirteenth place, ahead of Fabio Quartararo and Jorge Navarro in fourteenth and fifteenth places respectively.

Andrea Locatelli, Joe Roberts and Khairul Idham Pawi make up row six; Isaac Vinales, Iker Lecuona and Bo Bendsneyder row seven; Tetsuta Nagashima, Stefano Manzi and the inured Luca Marini were 22nd, 23rd and 24th, but Marini’s 6-place grid drop for tomorrow for his crash with Navarro in Spain means he will start 30th.

That means Lukas Tulovic will start from the back of row eight, and Steven Odendaal will head up row nine from Hector Garzo and Jules Danilo. Federico Fuligni and the replacement for Zulfahmi Khairrudin, Niki Tuuli, will start alongside Marini on row ten.

Danny Kent will start 31st, ahead of wildcards Corentin Perolari and Xavi Cardelus on row eleven, whilst the final two places of the 35-bike grid will be taken by Eric Granado and Cedric Tangre.

After four rounds of the 2018 Moto2 World Championship, it is Francesco Bagnaia who is leading the standings. It has not been a perfect start to the number 42’s season, a ninth place in Argentina definitely proving something of a blot on the copy book at the moment, as well as providing reason to doubt his championship credentials. But two wins in Qatar and Texas, as well as a third-place last time out in Spain, have proven enough, so far to be able to land Pecco the top spot in the championship at this stage. Le Mans has proved fruitful for Bagnaia in the past too; he scored his second Moto2 podium there last year with a second place, just 1.7 seconds off winner and eventual champion Franco Morbidelli, and he took third place in the 2016 Moto3 race on the Mahindra behind the KTMs of Romano Fenati and Brad Binder. With that in mind, the championship leader could be tough to beat this weekend, but as ever in Moto2, and especially this weekend, there is no shortage of riders who will fancy their chances this weekend.

None fit that description more, perhaps, than Bagnaia’s flatmate, and fellow VR46 Academy rider, Lorenzo Baldassarri. The Pons HP40 rider won the last race at Jerez in convincing fashion, with superior pace across the whole weekend that he put to use in the race on Sunday to win by nearly three seconds. It was his second win of his career, and an important one, because he had been knocking on the door of a victory in the first two races, but struggled a bit more in Austin. The victory took him back to second in the championship standings, nine points behind Bagnaia – so the Italian is firmly in the hunt. But it has been two crashes in the last two years for Balda in Le Mans, and he will need to change that if he wants to remain in the championship fight which, this year, seems tighter than ever in the intermediate class.

Miguel Oliveira announced in Jerez that he will be moving to MotoGP in 2019 with the Tech3 KTM team – a smart move by all accounts. However, the announcement seemed to disrupt the Portuguese’s rhythm on Saturday in Spain, when he qualified fourteenth. Clearly frustrated by the poor result, he fought back viciously in the race, to come back to the top positions in five laps, and end up finishing a fairly comfortable second. However, Jerez proved that, at least in the case of Baldassarri and the Pons team, it is possible for the Kalex chassis to keep hold of the rear Dunlop just as well, if not better, than the KTM, and this was an area which was thought to be a particular strong point of the Austrian chassis. The loss of this advantage could prove pivotal in the title battle, and furthermore the Le Mans layout proved a difficult one for the KTMs last year: Ricky Cardus (who was replacing Brad Binder) finished thirteenth and Oliveira could only manage seventeenth. It is possible that the high grip surface (which was new for last year) disadvantaged the KTMs with their soft-on-tyres chassis, and if that is the case then this year it should not be as bad since the surface has lost a little bit of grip since last year. Either way, the KTM teams will have last year’s data to work with to solve any issues, which should help them if they encounter similar issues. If they struggle like last year, it could be a critical weekend for the Kalex riders to make an advantage to the likes of Oliveira and Binder.

Fifteen points separate Mattia Pasini from the top of the championship. The Italian veteran has a sniff at this title, and when Paso senses the door ajar, he requires no invitation to charge through it. Not only that, but Le Mans is the round before Mugello; Pasini’s home race and a special one for him. He will be looking to head to Mugello in good form, to hope to fight for the victory like last year.

Le Mans is one of Marini’s favourite circuits, and last year he scored his best ever qualifying position with fourth. He made a bad start, though, and was trying to come back through the field when he fell trying to pass Pasini at the first part of Les Esses Bleu. Last race in Jerez, Marini crashed into Jorge Navarro on lap one at Dry Sack, and as such he will start 6 places lower than his qualifying position this weekend. To add to the number 10’s woes, he has suffered a dislocated shoulder in the run up to this weekend, so it will be a tough one for the Italian, but he could spring a surprise.

The likes of Xavi Vierge, Alex Marquez and Joan Mir should all be competitive this weekend. Vierge was in the fight for the podium in Jerez but just ran out of time to launch an attack on Bagnaia at the end. Marquez, in Spain was the only rider who, over the course of the weekend could match Baldassarri’s pace, but a strange crash in the race prevented him from challenging for the podium. Joan Mir would likely to have been in that podium fight as well, if he was not feeling ill with a stomach bug. The Swiss Innovative Investors KTMs of Sam Lowes and Iker Lecuona could be there too, if the KTM has a better time of it this year in France than it did last. And with all of those considerations, it is fair to say the French Moto2 Grand Prix is shaping up to be an exciting affair, and perhaps we will see the first non-Italian intermediate class win of 2018.

After Friday’s practice and qualifying on Saturday, it was Lorenzo Baldassarri who was the favourite to take victory in the fourth round of the 2018 Moto2 World Championship, at the Spanish Grand Prix from Jerez.

But it was Alex Marquez who made it to turn one first, and took the initial lead as he looked to take his first win of the season at his home round. But it was not long before Lorenzo Baldassarri claimed the lead for himself, and from there on it was a question of tyres. With Miguel Oliveira making a stunning comeback from fourteenth on the grid, it soon became an opportunity to see whether KTM still held their advantage over Kalex in tyre consumption, and considering the prowess of the Pons HP40 team in setting a bike up to save its tyres, it was sure to be an intriguing battle.

Oliveira was able to get close to Balda on many occasions, but in the final eight to ten laps, the Italian just slowly stretched the gap on the Portuguese with sublime consistency and outstanding pace, to finally take victory after over 18 months since his first win at home in Misano. The win for Lorenzo was an important one, for him and the team. Pons HP40 had not won since Alex Rins went to Ecstar Suzuki in MotoGP for the 2017 season, and suffered last year with their rider pairing of Fabio Quartararo and Edgar Pons. Even this year, not many people expected them to challenge with Baldassarri or his teammate Hector Barbera, and if people did expect them to challenge, they expected it to be Barbera at the front and not Balda. But, ultimately, they are a championship winning team, and they belong at the front, and that is precisely where Baldassarri has taken them. Equally, Baldassarri had a difficult 2017, and failed to make the podium as he, along with then teammate Luca Marini and their VR46 management, conflicted with the Forward Racing team for whom they rode. Sito Pons took a big gamble to take on Baldassarri for this year, and thankfully for the pair of them it seems to be paying off, Baldassarri sits just nine points off the championship leader, his flatmate Pecco Bagnaia, and looks as though he may be able to challenge for this championship.

Miguel Oliveira’s ride was stunning. In five laps he had gone from fourteenth to six and a few minutes later he was second and chasing down Baldassarri for the lead. It is entirely possible that the fight through the pack took too much life out of the rear Dunlop on the KTM, and that that is why Miguel failed to sustain his victory challenge. Aki Ajo said on the grid that Oliveira was back for Sunday, implying that the Portuguese had had an ‘off day’ on Saturday, hence his poor qualifying position. Either way, the points taken by Oliveira on Sunday were crucial for his championship.

They were even more important considering he took points out of his deficit to two-time race winner this season, Pecco Bagnaia, who started and finished third. The Italian struggled to keep the pace of Baldassarri all weekend, as did most, but did well to take a podium, his third of the season. It is true that he would have missed the podium without the mid-race crash of Alex Marquez at turn two, but mistakes are what win and lose championships – it is not the fault of Bagnaia that Marquez made the mistake. Moreover, the number 42 will be content knowing that next up is Le Mans, and he showed great pace at the French circuit last season, whilst the KTMs struggled.

It was not a comfortable podium for the championship leader, though – he was pushed all the way by Xavi Vierge on the Dynavolt Intact GP Kalex, as he continued his solid form of late, and Mattia Pasini rounded out the top five. Paso seemed like he could have had the pace for the podium had his qualifying been better, as he was matching the pace of Vierge and Bagnaia at the end, but was just too far back to make it matter.

Brad Binder had a difficult race in sixth. The South African looked good at the start and seemed as though he could challenge for the victory, especially if the KTM was going to keep good life in its tyres until the end of the race, but after five or six laps he started to drop back and looked very loose on the rear. It was a shame for Binder because for the first time this season he had qualified at the front and was in a position to challenge, but for whatever reason it never happened. The positive for Binder is that he proved that he can have the pace, and surely his first Moto2 victory is not far away.

Marcel Schrotter made a good comeback in the race from 20^th on the grid after a three-place grid penalty to finish seventh and ahead of the winner of the 2016 edition of this race, Sam Lowes, by half a second. Ninth place went to Iker Lecuona, who was another rider to make a decent comeback in the race after starting eighteenth, and Fabio Quartararo rounded out the top ten.

Joan Mir, undoubtedly held back by his stomach bug from Saturday, finished eleventh, ahead of Simone Corsi, a somewhat impressive Tetsuta Nagashima in thirteenth, Hector Barbera and Andrea Locatelli who took the last point in fifteenth.

Sixteenth place was taken by Bo Bendsneyder, ahead of 17^th placed Jorge Navarro who was recovering from lap one after he was taken out by Luca Marini at Dry Sack. It looked like Marini had out-braked himself and dived to the inside to avoid Sam Lowes directly in front of him, but could do nothing to avoid cleaning out Navarro. Marini should have gone to the outside to avoid Lowes, really, like Andrea Iannone should have done in Barcelona with Jorge Lorenzo in 2016, but things are a lot easier in hindsight. Khairul Idham Pawi took eighteenth place, in front of Isaac Vinales, Lukas Tulovic, Federico Fuligni, Xavi Cardelus who tested the MotoGP Avintia Ducati on Monday and was frighteningly slow, Hector Garzo and Jules Danilo who crashed early in the race but got back on to finish one lap down in 24^th and last place.

There were quite a few retirements, perhaps owing a large part to the lack of grip in the searing Spanish heat. Marini was the first to go after his collision with Navarro, then Eric Granado went on lap three, Romano Fenati on lap seven, Stefano Manzi on lap nine, Zulfahmi Kharrudin (who has since been sacked) on lap ten, Danny Kent went with thirteen to go, the same lap as Alex Marquez crashed out of podium contention; Joe Roberts fell with just five laps to go and Steven Odendaal with two.

The dominance in this race from Baldassarri surely puts him into the frame for a championship challenge, especially with the miniscule gap that currently separates him from Bagnaia. Le Mans is next up, where last year the KTMs struggled, so there could be an opportunity in a couple of weeks for the Kalex riders to make a big difference in the championship, and it is not an opportunity that they can pass up if it arrives.

 

As usual, the qualifying session for Moto2 got underway in Jerez after the excitement of MotoGP. The expectation was that the track would get slower as the session wound on, and therefore the fastest times would be set at the beginning of the session. But this was not the case.

Lorenzo Baldassarri set his pole position lap of a 1’41.925 on his 16^th lap of 18 in the session. It was the Italian’s first pole position of his Grand Prix career, and sets him up well to take his first victory of 2018, first since Misano 2016 and second in his career, in tomorrow’s race. But a qualifying lap, of course, is not indicative of pace to win a race. What is, though, is consistently fast long run pace over the weekend, and Baldassarri has had that in abundance over the last two days. The number 7 will be a tough man to beat.

Second place went to Alex Marquez, and he is of the feeling that Baldassarri will have an advantage in tomorrow’s race. But this is his home Grand Prix and you can bet that Marquez will be determined to stop Baldassarri from getting away, in the vein of Pasini with Oliveira in Argentina, or Rossi with Stoner at Laguna 2008.

The remaining place of the front row will be occupied by Pecco Bagnaia on tomorrow’s Moto2 grid, as the championship leader puts himself in a strong position to take win number three from the opening four races. It could perhaps be considered a trait of Bagnaia over the course of his Moto2 career that he has been kind on tyres, and that could be critical tomorrow with the line between running the harder or softer compound Dunlop rear slick appearing to be very fine indeed.

That, in theory, should bring the KTMs into play, with their infamous rear tyre conservation. But whilst Brad Binder will set off in fifth place tomorrow, just behind the impressive Jorge Navarro who took the fourth-fastest qualifying time. Miguel Oliveira will start from way down in fourteenth on the number 44 bike. This is not the way the Portuguese would have wished to celebrate the announcement of his signing for Tech 3 KTM for next season, and will be eager to begin his fight back through the field tomorrow.

On the back of row two will be the unfortunately ill Joan Mir, who is suffering with a stomach bug that was so intrusive that he had to miss the final minutes of FP3. This makes the Spaniard’s qualifying efforts all the more impressive. Tomorrow the rookie will be hoping to claim his first Moto2 podium at home in front of the Spanish GP crowd, although his endurance will be put fully to the test in the searing Andalusian sun.

Xavi Vierge goes off of seventh tomorrow, the head of row three, ahead of Sam Lowes, who had a crash in qualifying, and Romano Fenati, who has had a brilliant weekend on the Snipers Kalex, but Xavi could struggle to hold onto the tyres in the latter stages of tomorrow’s race.

Mattia Pasini will have work to do tomorrow afternoon starting in 10^th, if he is to limit the damage done to his championship challenge, should the front row fulfil their respective potentials. Joining Mattia on the fourth row will be Danny Kent and Luca Marini.

Fifth row comprises of Simone Corsi will start from thirteenth place, with the aforementioned Oliveira and Hector Barbera behind him. The sixteenth fastest time went to Tetsuta Nagashima, who will start on row six ahead of Marcel Schotter and Fabio Quartararo. Meanwhile, Iker Lecuona underperformed with the nineteenth fastest lap, but will start of Andrea Locatelli and Isaac Vinales on row seven, whilst row eight will consist of Stefano Manzi, Bo Bendsneyder and Domi Aegerter’s replacement, Lukas Tulovic.

Khairul Idham Pawi will be 25th on the grid, ahead of the two NTS bikes of Steven Odendaal and Joe Roberts. Eric Granado, Jules Danilo and Hector Garzo make up row ten, and the final row will be occupied by wildcard Xavi Cardelus, Federico Fuligni and Zulfahmi Khairuddin.

Three races down in the 2018 Moto2 World Championship, and it is Francesco Bagnaia who leads the pack as the paddock arrives in Jerez for the first European round of the season. A win in the opening round of the season in Qatar, where he won a last-lap battle with his flatmate Lorenzo Baldassarri, saw Pecco take the immediate lead in the championship, but a ninth place in Argentina meant that he had to bounce back well in Austin. He did that – winning the race comfortably in the end after Alex Marquez led the early laps. Thinking to Jerez, it is the place where Bagnaia took his first Grand Prix podium back in 2016 on the Aspar Mahindra, and again last year he took his first Moto2 podium at the Spanish track. With that in mind, it could take a particularly special performance to beat the number 42 this weekend, but there are plenty lining up to do just that.

Firstly, Alex Marquez. The Spaniard has had the pace to at least be on the podium in all three of the opening fly-away races. In Qatar he somewhat fulfilled that, although an overheating rear brake cost him a chance to fight for the win in the season opener. Argentina went a different way for the Marc VDS rider, though, as he made a mistake in the closing stages of the race when trying to pass Baldassarri for fourth place, and that cost him a chance at the Argentine podium – fifth in the end for the 2014 Moto3 World Champion. Last time out, in Austin, Marquez was the pre-race favourite, and early on it looked as though he was going to take his first win of the year, but it was not meant to be as Bagnaia’s tyre conservation proved superior, and Marquez was left to fight off the late charge of Miguel Oliveira for second place. But Marquez won this race last year, and you could argue that it was only so because his teammate and eventual World Champion Franco Morbidelli crashed out in the early part of the race, but equally it is possible to say that it was the pace of Marquez early on that brought the mistake out of Morbidelli, handing Marquez a comfortable victory. Will it be quite as simple for the home favourite this year? Probably not. The KTMs are stronger and in bigger numbers this year, and there are a number of Kalex riders who look strong at this early phase of the season. But do not discount Marquez, he will be there.

But perhaps this weekend will finally be the coming of the KTMs. Qatar never materialised for the Austrian marque, the two ‘factory’ riders, Oliveira and Brad Binder, had average qualifying performances, and even more average first laps, and Sam Lowes on the Swiss Innovative Investors KTM had a false neutral issue, which eventually caused him to crash midway through the race at the final corner. Argentina should have been Miguel Oliveira’s win, but the determination of Mattia Pasini proved enough to deny the Portuguese, who took his first 2018 podium in the end with third place. Once more, Austin should have seen the Portuguese flag lifted above the top spot on the rostrum, but another poor qualifying for both Oliveira and Binder, coupled with average-at-best opening laps for the pair, and a bizarre crash early on for front-running Sam Lowes meant that once again there was nothing that anyone on a KTM could do about the win. But, finally, in Austin we saw the KTMs excel where we expected, late in the race, with supreme tyre management. Oliveira’s pace once he got some open asphalt in front of him was only matched by Joan Mir when he too cleared the train that had formed from third place down to about twelfth or thirteenth. With that in mind, and with the nature of Jerez, even with the new surface, the KTM riders will once again be in with a good chance to take the victory.

Jerez is a good circuit for some of the KTM riders, too, with Brad Binder picking up his first Grand Prix win back in 2016 when he started from last, and Sam Lowes dominated the Moto2 race the same year when he was riding the Gresini Kalex. Also, it is the first race of the season to be held at a race track known by Iker Lecuona, who has shown good progress so far this season on the #27 SII KTM (he is Sam Lowes’ teammate), and yet he had not been to any of the three tracks the World Championship has so far visited in 2018. Could a first Grand Prix podium be on the cards for the young Spaniard?

Mattia Pasini has already claimed one win this season, and started it much better than one year ago. In 2017, the opening races of the season for Paso were a demonstration in how to throw away good positions in the middle of races, but in 2018 he finished fourth in Qatar, first in Argentina and seventh after a tyre choice mistake in Austin. Pasini took until Jerez last year to turn his sharp-end pace into a sharp-end result, when he finished fourth, just beaten by Oliveira at the end of the race as the KTM rider came through with, you guessed it, better rear tyre life. Pasini has no option but to eye the championship this season, and will be aiming for the win this weekend – as we saw in Argentina (and Mugello last year), when Paso can win, he is very difficult to deny.

It would also be a mistake to discount Joan Mir this weekend. He had the pace for his first podium in Moto2 in Texas, but he got caught up in an incident with Domi Aegerter on the first lap which cost him the chance ultimately. Maybe at his home race, Mir can do as Bagnaia last year, and claim his first intermediate class rostrum.

Two riders will not be in attendance this weekend: Domi Aegerter and Remy Gardner, both of whom injured themselves in training crashed – a broken hip for Domi and a pair of broken legs and an ankle for Gardner will keep the pair out for Jerez and maybe also Le Mans (in fact that is almost a certainty for Remy). Gardner will be replaced by Hector Garzo this weekend, who replaced Xavi Vierge last year in Germany, and qualified on the front row, although he crashed out of the race and has so far been out-performed (at least out-paced) by his teammate in the CEV Moto2 European Championship, Lucas Tulovic, but it is a big opportunity for Garzo on a circuit he knows. But it will be Tulovic who replaces Aegerter at Kiefer Racing, which is an opportunity similar to that of Garzo – a big one on a track he knows.

Normally, this would be the point in the season where we really start to see who can compete for the championship, because everyone knows Jerez, and also because it shares similarities with almost every other track on the calendar. However, this weekend is perhaps a little bit different for the Moto2 class, because the field is so competitive. But that just means that we should be in for a classic Moto2 battle, right?

Featured image courtesy of Redbull Contentpool

Ahead of the third round of the 2018 Moto2 World Championship, Alex Marquez was on pole, sharing the front row with the KTM of Sam Lowes and Mattia Pasini. Francesco Bagnaia headed up row two, as he looked to bounce back after a disappointing Argentinian round. Joan Mir was fifth on the grid, with Luca Marini sixth. Xavi Vierge, Marcel Schrotter and Fabio Quartararo were on row three. It had been a poor qualifying for the ‘factory’ KTMs, as the Red Bull Ajo bikes of Miguel Oliveira and Brad Binder were down in twelfth and sixteenth – in fact they were the lowest-placed KTMs on the grid ahead of the eighteen-lap race.

By far the favourite for the race win, it was Alex Marquez who made the holeshot and took the early lead. Sam Lowes had a poor getaway, and dropped back to fifth in the initial stages, with Pasini, Bagnaia and Vierge finding their way past the British rider early on.

Notably, Pasini had chosen the harder option rear tyre, whereas everyone else had gone with the softer option. This was clearly not working for him at the start but the hope for him was that after six or seven laps it might start to come in, and he could start to make his way back through the pack. But he could not hold back Bagnaia, who passed him on the first lap before pointing his crosshairs at the leader, Marquez, and began closing down the near-one-second gap that Marquez had created.

It took Bagnaia a few laps, but eventually he caught Marquez and with ten to go; the gap was essentially nothing. He waited a few laps, perhaps managing the tyre, but Bagnaia finally made his move with nine to go at turn eleven, but he ran wide, allowing Alex back through.

Whilst Pecco was waiting to try again, Oliveira passed Vierge for third with eight to go, but surely the five or six second gap that had appeared between Bagnaia in second and Vierge in third was too much for the Portuguese rider to close down with the limited time remaining in the race.

The next move from Bagnaia came at turn one with six laps to go, but there was a sublime response from the Spaniard at turn three just a few seconds later. Once more, Bagnaia came back, this time at turn eleven when Marquez ran wide. The #73 came back through with the slipstream down the main straight, but the Sky Racing Team VR46 Kalex moved back through on the brakes for turn twelve. After hanging on through the ‘go-kart’ section of the track, Pecco now had a chance to hold the lead, but Alex was not dropped yet.
By this point, with five laps to go, Oliveira was now with far superior pace compared to the front two, lapping nearly one second faster than the leaders. The only person who could match his pace in the final laps was Joan Mir, which is perhaps very telling.

An apparent mistake on lap fourteen from Bagnaia allowed Marquez to come back to him, but the next four laps from the Italian were just what was needed to hold on, and take the win. It was an important win, too, for Bagnaia, after his poor performance in Argentina: where he finished only ninth. It was a win which made him the first double winner of 2018 in Moto2, and also meant that there is still an Italian domination in the intermediate class thanks to Pasini’s victory two weeks ago. In addition, first place in COTA allowed last year’s ‘Rookie of the Year’ to return to the top of the championship, and this time with a ten-point lead which, with the incredible depth of field in Moto2 this season, could be about as big as anyone gets all season.

Alex Marquez held on well for second. For sure, he would have expected to win, but finally he did not have the endurance in the softer tyre that Bagnaia or Oliveira did. Fortunately for Marquez, he did manage to build a large gap whilst the likes of Vierge and Pasini were running at the front and not allowing Oliveira to show his ultimate pace. Perhaps the biggest positive for Marquez after this race is that, despite the difficulties he faced in the final laps, he did not make a mistake and throw it all away as he might have done in the past, and that could be crucial looking forward with respect to the championship.

Fourth place went to Miguel Oliveira who will be ruing his poor qualifying. Without that, he could have won – he was the only rider who could run the mid-to-low elevens at the end of the race, with the possible exception of Joan Mir, and if he had started at the front we wouldn’t have seen so much of him on the TV.

Joan Mir had another stunning ride for fourth place. He will be disappointed as his fifth-placed qualifying was his best in Moto2, and it gave him his best opportunity so far for a top result. However, an incident with Dominique Aegerter at turn one on the first lap shoved him to the back of the pack, and meant that he had to fight from the lower reaches of the top twenty to salvage his race. And salvage it he did, with sublime passes on riders, who are no mugs: riders with far superior experience to him. His fourth place probably did not match what he deserved. Furthermore, his pace in the end of the race was only matched by Oliveira, on the KTM which is famed for its gentle treatment to the tyres, and realistically if everything was ‘how it should have been’, if you like, Mir should have been fighting with Oliveira for the win in COTA, and it would be hard to bet against the Spaniard in such a fight. Either way, it was a brilliant performance from the 2017 Moto3 World Champion, and surely he is only going to get faster when the championship heads to Europe in just a couple of weeks.

Iker Lecuona took by far his best Grand Prix result with a fifth place for the eighteen-year-old. Like Mir, you would expect him to get stronger in Europe – he had never been to Austin before this weekend. Lecuona was followed in by Brad Binder, who, like his teammate, had to recover from a poor qualifying and finished sixth after quite a wild race for the South African with quite a few moments. Pasini was seventh, and suffered with his choice of the harder rear tyre. He might have had an advantage in the end of the race, but never had the free track to use it thanks to how tight the pack was behind the leaders. Eighth place went to Jorge Navarro, who beat home Domi Aegerter and Lorenzo Baldassarri who was tenth.

Isaac Vinales was eleventh, ahead of Simone Corsi who is seemingly really struggling in the Tasca Racing team. Luca Marini was thirteenth – and seemed quite good in the beginning of the race but could not keep up the pace towards the end, perhaps due to a shoulder that he dislocated at the MotoRanch last week. Andrea Locatelli was fourteenth and Fabio Quartararo rounded out the points in fifteenth.

Sixteenth went to Romano Fenati who is still looking for his first Moto2 points. Remy Gardner was seventeenth, ahead of Hector Barbera who is still struggling to adapt to Moto2 after eight seasons in MotoGP. The Japanese Tetsuta Nagashima was nineteenth, Bo Bendsneyder rounded out the top twenty, ahead of Steven Odendaal on the leading NTS chassis. Eric Granado was the only Suter to finish, and did so down in 22nd, ahead of sole home hero Joe Roberts.

Sam Lowes had an early crash at turn eighteen but got back on and finished 24th. Khairul Idham Pawi finished 25th, ahead of Jules Danilo, Zulfahmi Khairrudin and Federico Fuligni who was the 28th and final finisher.
There were four retirements: Xavi Vierge, Stefano Manzi, Marcel Schotter and Danny Kent.

Next, the Moto2 World Championship goes back to Europe, and to Jerez, the circuit where Bagnaia took his first Moto2 World Championship podium last season. With that in mind, is anyone going to be able to stop the current championship leader when the paddock arrives in Spain?

The Circuit of the Americas is a phenomenally difficult circuit. From the heavy braking zone into turn one, you head into the snake, changing direction from turn two until turn ten, before the kink of turn eleven and the heavy brake into turn twelve – a critical corner for the run down the near-1km long main straight. From there, the riders head into turn thirteen – unlucky for many. In the Moto2 class, this is a deceleration from about 170mph down to around 50mph. Then starts what the Formula One drivers refer to as the “go-kart section”, as the riders twist between first gear corners, where the only way to overtake is to cause a crash. But the positive thing about this relatively unnecessary section is that it leads into the wonderful triple right-hander of turns eighteen, nineteen and twenty – watch for the rear tyres spinning on the exit there, which leads straight into turn twenty-one, a miserable off-camber right hander which just begs for you to exceed the track limits on corner exit, especially in the lightweight and intermediate classes where corner speed is more important. From there, finally, after just over two minutes, the riders arrive at the final corner, which is pretty average as final corners go, and on the exit there is just the short run to the line.

That’s a lap of COTA. It isn’t a particularly amazing one. From the point of view of a rider, it is too physical to really enjoy. The only enjoyment to come from the Austin circuit is winning, and if you’re in MotoGP there is only one person who can do that. Fortunately, Moto2 is somewhat more competitive, and after a thrilling race in Argentina the championship is completely open as the 2018 World Championship heads into round three.

The championship leader before this weekend starts is none other than Mattia Pasini, the Italian veteran performing a perfect display of offensive defence. Can Paso win the title? Well, like his compatriot in Moto3, Marco Bezzecchi, Pasini’s credentials will be determined in the next races, but it would be foolish at this stage to suggest that Mattia has no chance. Last year in COTA, though, like Argentina last year too, Pasini crashed out of a top position. If he wants to fight for the championship, and there is no reason why he shouldn’t, or wouldn’t, want to do that, he cannot afford a repeat, such is the level in Moto2 this season.

With a fourth place in Argentina to go with his second in Qatar, Lorenzo Baldassarri lies second in the World Championship and has started 2018 the best he has started any season. Last year was a disappointing one for Balda, and Texas was no different, as he was taken out early on by Yonny Hernandez, but realistically Lorenzo should not have been back towards the bottom end of the top twenty anyway. With Pons this year, the Italian has had a reset, and sat as the lead rider in such a top outfit is clearly suiting him well, hence the good start this year. Furthermore, no team with a Kalex frame can keep hold of rear tyres like Pons, and with questions being asked about the abrasiveness of the surface for this weekend at COTA, that could prove critical in the battle with the KTMs.

Speaking of which, Miguel Oliveira, whilst having had a better time of it back in Argentina would have been disappointed that he could only manage third place. In the second half of the race, it was clear that Oliveira had the best pace of the leaders, but he just could not find a way to keep Pasini behind when he was able to pass the Italian. For Miguel, COTA last year was not so great either, when he finished only sixth, and thirteen seconds off the win. However, with the improvements made to the KTM since then, and also considering the Austrian chassis’ superior tyre management compared to Kalex in conjunction with the supposedly overly abrasive surface, we could see Oliveira win his first race of the year this weekend, and if Oliveira is there, it would be a mistake to discount Binder.

The positive for Oliveira is that Pecco Bagnaia, supposedly the Portuguese’s biggest championship threat, had a poor time in Argentina as he only managed ninth. For Pecco, it seemed to go downhill from FP2 when he seemed to have an issue with the bike. After that, he had a poor qualifying and struggled for pace in the race. It was not a complete disaster, though, for Pecco, who won the opening race, as he still sits in third place in the standings. But a recovery this weekend will be critical before the World Championship returns to Europe.

The way the first two races panned out, with no one from the podium in Qatar returning in Argentina, means that there are six riders covered by just eleven points heading into this weekend, with obviously Pasini, Baldassarri and Bagnaia leading Xavi Vierge, who had a ridiculously exciting race in Argentina; Oliveira and Alex Marquez, who could have won in Qatar but for an overheating rear brake and could have been on the podium in Argentina but for a mistake when trying to pass Baldassarri. It might be reasonable to suggest that each of those rider will be somewhere in the mix this weekend – and if they are it should be one hell of a race.

 

Featured image courtesy of Redbull contentpool