Dutch MotoGP: Francesco Bagnaia takes dominant sprint win, Marc Marquez crashes out

Francesco Bagnaia continues his dominant weekend at Assen with comfortable sprint win.

Francesco Bagnaia
Francesco Bagnaia

Hoping to make a perfect start, polesitter Francesco Bagnaia did just that as he held onto the lead.

Jorge Martin kept hold of P2 as Alex Marquez moved ahead of Maverick Vinales for third.

Disaster then struck Marc Marquez, who after crashing at the end of Q2, lost control after clipping too much of the inside kerb at turn two [lap two].

Marquez was unable to rejoin the action as there was too much damage to his GP23.

With Bagnaia and Martin pulling away, Vinales made a decisive move on Alex Marquez at the final chicane to gain P3.

Vinales began catching the top two but lap times were very tight which was making it hard for the Aprilia rider to make enough of an impact.

Alex Rins joined Marc Marquez in crashing out of the sprint race on lap nine, while at the front, Bagnaia now had a lead of over one second.

Further back, Enea Bastianini was making impressive progress as he overtook Binder and A. Marquez for P4 on lap nine.

Leading the battle for fifth, Alex Marquez was awarded a Long Lap penalty due to exceeding track limits.

On the final lap Aleix Espargaro suffered a monster crash in the final sector, while Bagnaia came across the line with a comfortable margin over Martin and Vinales.

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