VOL. 55 ISSUE 40 OCTOBER 9, 2018 P87
stages, but suffering brake problems had
been obliged to settle for second as Bagnaia
took firm control at half distance. Then it be-
came third, costing him another four points.
His Red Bull teammate, Brad Binder, had
been shadowing him throughout, with each
having at least a spell in the lead in the early
stages, but he had succumbed to the late-
charging Marini on the 22nd lap.
Bagnaia explained that he thought the hot
conditions had "made it easier for me. I could
see Oliveira was struggling, and I made my
move."
Oliveira was philosophical. "I pushed a lot,
but I had a problem with the front brake— the
lever was sometimes too close and some-
times so far, so I didn't know how to adjust it.
There are still four races. Never give up."
It had taken time for Bagnaia to apply his
stranglehold. He jumped into the lead from
the second row, but at the end of lap three
Oliveira took over; while Binder and pole
starter Lorenzo Baldassarri (Pons HP40
Kalex) disputed third. The latter took it, lost it
again when he missed a gear and ran wide,
then crashed trying to regain lost ground.
By now, Marini had shuffled Alex Marquez
(EG-VDS Kalex) back to sixth, then the Span-
iard also slipped off after regaining the posi-
tion, his fourth crash in the past five races.
Now Fabio Quartararo (Speed Up) caught
up and engaged with Marini, ahead of him for
three laps, which gave the three up front a
gap of a second. Then Marini took over again
from the Frenchman, but it wasn't until the last
five laps that he started to gain speed even as
the KTMs were losing it, giving Bagnaia the
chance he needed to escape.
The gap on lap 16 had been 1.4 seconds.
On lap 22 he'd caught and passed Binder,
and on the last lap, when Oliveira ran wide at
turn three, he took over second place.
Mattia Pasini (Italtrans Kalex) was a lone
sixth, having dropped off Iker Lecuona (SII
Francesco Bagnaia (42)
put in a stirring ride
to better Luca Marini
and Miguel Oliveira
(44) and give himself
a 28-point buffer in the
championship.
