Moto3 Austria: Bezzecchi wins, injured Martin makes podium
Marco Bezzecchi took a hard-earned win at the Red Bull Ring in Spielberg, leading a front group of four for most of the Austrian Moto3 Grand Prix to take a home victory for KTM.
The Redox PruestelGP rider had started from pole and was only briefly overtaken by Jorge Martin in the closing stages with the pair swapping lead corner after corner, but the Italian got back in his rhythm to win the race by 0.473s opening his championship advantage to twelve points over Martin.
The Leopard Racing Honda riders; Enea Bastianini and Lorenzo Dalla Porta had been glued at the hip all weekend and the race was no different, they swapped record pace laps to force their way into the lead group on the penultimate lap, with Bastianini then putting in a series of aggressive overtakes to claim a superb second after dropping as low as 14th at the start of the race.
An emotional Martin had that stab at taking the win, and impressed by holding on to the final podium spot, an incredible feat given the fact that it was only a week ago he broke his wrist in Brno. Riding with the aid of painkillers the Gresini rider gave everything, riding tough to keep the final Rostrum spot, his contact in the final corners with Jaume Masia was slight and after review in race direction was declared a racing incident.
Albert Arenas had been in the mix in the original lead four, surviving a wobble at one stage on his Angel Nieto team bike for fourth.
Also missing out on the podium were Dalla Porta, who took fifth, and Bester Capital Dubai’s Masia, the devastated seventeen year old had already run a little wide before that contact with Martin took him out of the top three. He was the top rookie finisher in the race.
John McPhee (CIP - Green Power) started the last lap in seventh, after starting 30th and last, his incredible progress was the undone as Fabio Di Giannantonio’s move took him wide and pushed McPhee out with him and into the run-off area.
That position instead went to Ayumu Sasaki (Petronas Sprinta Racing) with RBA’s Gabriel Rodrigo coming through for eighth, Tony Arbolino (Marinelli Snipers) ninth and Aron Canet progeressing to tenth for Estrella Galicia.
Gresini’s Di Gianantonio took the flag next in eleventh, with the Brit taking the flag in twelfth, though still a great ride after crashing twice in qualifying.
The remaining points went to Jakub Kornfeil (Redox PruestelGP), who had to give a position back over the course of the race for running wide too often in 13th, Philipp Oettl (Sudmetal Schedl GP) in 14th and Marcos Ramirez (Bester Capital Dubai) in 15th.
Ai Ogura was the best of the wildcard entries in 20th for the Asia Talent Team. Max Kofler (Motorsport Kofler) was 29th.
Andrea Migno was the only faller, out wide on the green strip his bike the folded under him at turn ten with eleven lap remaining.
