Cycle News

VOL. 52 ISSUE 43 OCTOBER 27, 2015 P57 straight then the final hairpin. Now as he ran wide he glanced twice over his shoulder at Mar- quez, slowed and ran further out to the track edge, then slowed some more. It then looked as though he'd then batted Marquez off with his knee, although it could have been earlier impact from the Honda that caused the leg movement. The result was the same—Marquez down and out, Rossi in disgrace. Anybody expecting a quick de- cision from Race Direction (most usually a ride-through, or even disqualification) would be disap- pointed. They wanted to speak to both riders first. The race went on, the front three continued in the same order to the finish. And then the argu- ments began. Rossi's first response was that, because Marquez was always able to pass him down the straight, he had tried another tactic. "I lose a lot of time with Marc, so for turn 14 I try to go a little wider, to take the better line and make him slow, because he was just riding to cause me some problems. Unfortunately he come to me and he crash at that mo- ment." After being called before race direction and handed an effective back-of-the-grid penalty for the next race, he cut the (supposedly MOTO 2: CLOSE BUT NOT ENOUGH Thomas Luthi claimed his first pole in three years in calm and steadfast fashion, but new World Champion Johann Zarco had the Derendinger Racing Kalex rider in sight, and some- times behind, throughout qualifying. The race followed the same pat- tern, though with a different out- come—Zarco waiting until the last lap to pounce to claim his eighth win of the year (equaling the record number of podiums for Marquez and Rabat). The leading pair battled on lap one, Zarco getting ahead on turn four, Luthi taking it back at the final hairpin, then they continued in this order as the laps counted down. At one stage, shortly after half distance, Luthi had stretched the gap to just over a sec- ond, but from there it started to shrink again, and as they started, Zarco was breathing down his neck. They swapped to and fro once, but at the second attempt Zarco was clear, and with obviously better corner speed, went on to win number eight by almost half a second. Luthi admitted he had overworked his tires and had no answer at the end. Top rookie Alex Rins had qualified third, but the Paginas Amarillas Kalex was slow off the line, and he had to fight his way past an eager Takaaki Nakagami before he could start clos- ing on fast-away second-row starter Jonas Folger for third. By lap five he was ahead of the German, but not only could he make no impression of a gap growing to- wards two seconds on the leaders, no more could he shake off Folger. The German was right behind when Rins ran too hot into the left-right complex behind the pits, lost the front, and tumbled out of contention. Some way back by now Lorenzo Baldassari, in another strong race on the Forward Kalex, had got past Nakagami, and the pair were leaving a fading Sam Lowes. By the finish, Nakagami had man- aged to gap the Italian teenager. The next group, led for a spell by Sandro Cortese, was now enlivened by the arrival from behind of Luis Sa- lom. By the finish he had cut through for sixth, Cortese still pressing hard; then Hafizh Syahrin, followed by Sim- one Corsi and Xavier Simeon. Axel Pons, Mika Kallio, Lowes and Ricky Cardus took the rest of the points, Lowes regaining 14th on the last lap. Marquez, Schrotter and Warokorn filled the crash list. Zarco now has 343 points, three short of Rabat's 2014 class record. No-score Rins is still ahead of the still-absent Rabat, 214-206, but Rabat will return for Valencia. Lowes (175) is under threat for fourth from both Luthi (163) and Folger (161). Thomas Luthi (12) led for almost the entire race, but Johann Zarco (5) had plenty in reserve for the final lap. Pedrosa's win was one of the most dominant of any rider this season.

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