Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/1091680
VOL. 56 ISSUE 10 MARCH 12, 2019 P73 stage Luthi had come through, and his arrival forced the pace of the pursuit. He was ahead of Gardner on lap 14, the Australian resisting strongly, and nar- rowly avoiding falling. Luthi's next target was his teammate, and he was ahead of him cleanly on lap 17, the gap already down to 0.8 of a second. There followed an inspiring pursuit over the last three laps. By the time they started the last one, he was right on the Italian's tail. He did get ahead briefly, only for Baldassari to regain the lead on the cut-back and he narrowly held off in the final sprint to the line. Behind the top seven, Luca Marini (SKY VR46 Kalex) had been losing speed throughout; while class rookie Enea Bastianini (Italtrans Kalex) made a brilliant debut in ninth, his final victim being front-row starter Xavi Vierge (EG-VDS Kalex). Vierge had led the first lap, but started losing ground almost imme- diately, with grip problems. It was an all-Kalex top ten, with the next-best another class rookie, Fabio Di Giannantonio, who finally come out on top in a late dice with Red Bull KTM's Brad Binder. American Racing's Joe Roberts (KTM) was 22nd. Iker Lecuona, Niccolo Bulega and Jorge Navarro crashed out on the first corner, followed soon after- wards by rookie Marco Bezzecchi. Nagashima and two more rookies, Chantra and Dixon, also crashed. Championship standings have Baldassarri leading on 25 from Luthi on 20, Schrotter on 16, Gardner next on 13 and Fernandez on 11. Moto3 Kaito Toba became the first Japanese rider to win in Moto3—and the first in any class since the late Shoyu Tomizawa in 2010—in a typically nail-biting Moto3 race that brought the sun down at Qatar. The 17-year-old Honda Team Asia rider, in his second season, prevailed over a grisly gang, ultra- close for the full distance. Starting from his first front row, he changed places twice on the final lap with second-placed Lorenzo Dalla Porta (Leopard Honda), who had led more times over the line than ROSSI FASTEST, THEN NOT Valentino Rossi's up-and-down start to the season, his first as a 40-year-old, went well only in Friday's FP1, when he was fastest. In FP2 he was struggling with a front tire that wore too fast and he failed to make it out of Q1. In the race, he made a typically war-like return, recovering positions throughout to claim an excellent fifth. But he had clearly been feeling the pressure, for he has already played his aero-body joker card even before the first race. Fairings had to be homologated before practice at Qatar, but every rider is allowed one update during the season. While teammate Maverick Vinales chose the latest version with two stepped wing-loops, Rossi (and the satellite-team riders) stuck with a version of the single loop as used last year. But on the second day of practice, Rossi was exercising the twin-loop version. Now he will be able to choose between the two versions for the rest of the season, but with no further changes. HAMILTON IN THE PITS Formula One Champion Lewis Hamilton was a one- day visitor to Qatar, sporting a cornrow hairstyle and a keen interest in his fellow-Petronas competitors in the new MotoGP satellite Yamaha team. Hamilton, en-route to the first car GP of the year in Australia, is a fan of MotoGP, and according to Petronas Yamaha rider Franco Morbidelli "asked a lot of questions about how I was riding. I didn't give him advice… just a lot of data," he said. He was impressed by "how humble he was, and how much interest he showed." DUCATI COMPLAINS Ducati were in a querulous mood, and reportedly complained to Race Direction after Marc Marquez's front-row qualifying lap—which knocked Jack Miller off the front row—had been achieved by him following Danilo Petrucci. Directly afterwards, he had passed the Italian rider, and then slowed. Marquez laughed it off. "Welcome to factory team racing," he said, adding, "I have been followed by many riders in my career." Responding to further questions, he admitted that this was not his usual strategy, but he had been happy to follow the Italian. He could probably have achieved a front-row lap time alone, "but with more risk." Briefly...