Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
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ROAD RACE FIM MOTOGP WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP ROUND 8 / JUNE 26, 2016 TT CIRCUIT ASSEN / ASSEN, THE NETHERLANDS P58 Moto3 BUNCH OF FIRSTS Pecco Bagnaia made his- tory by inches at Assen, in all sorts of ways. He won the first-ever Dutch TT on a Sunday; he won his own first GP, and the first for Ma- hindra. And, furthermore, it was the first-ever win for an Indian constructor. The first race of the day got away with it weather- wise, starting in the dry and running full distance. It was a typical Moto3 maelstrom—a huge front pack continually chang- ing places. Huge? At half distance, by when four members of it had already crashed out, the top 13 were still covered by just over 1.6 seconds. The absentees included free practice superstar Aron Canet (EG Honda), who had crashed at the start of qualifying to deny himself a classic debut pole. He was with the top gang in the race when he fell, also taking out Guevara. By then Rodrigo and Quartararo had also crashed together. Sky VR46 rider Romano Fe- nati was nine times leader over the line, and teammates Andrea Migno and (once) rookie Nicolo Bulega took their turns. Another rookie to do so once was Gresini Honda's Fabio Di Giannantonio. The Mahindra was there all the time, and Bagnaia took the honor six times in the race, and crucially for a seventh on the last lap. It was by the narrowest of mar- gins, for Migno had led into and out of the chicane. But Bagnaia was in front anyway, and then his rival was docked a further place for exceeding track limits on the last lap, ceding second to Di Giannantonio. The top three were within 0.039 of a second; the top six inside 0.161, with Fenati fourth, Niccolo Antonelli (Ongetta Rivacold Honda) next, then his teammate Jules Danilo. The race was almost a di- saster for points leader Brad Binder. The Red Bull KTM rider, in the top three at every race so far this year, was well up in the lead group when a slip after being pushed off-line in the fast Ramshoek left-hander sent him careening perilously across the wet grass at high speed. Amaz- ingly, he collected it and finished 12th. Pole starter Enea Bastianini (Gresini Honda) joined a long crash list, falling out of the front group with four laps to go. The top 10, still all close, was completed by Bulega, Mir (Leopard Honda), home hero Bendsneyder (Red Bull KTM) and fellow rookie Dalla Porta, substituting for absent-injured EG Honda star Jorge Navarro. Binder's four points help him retain a massive lead, at 151 points to absentee Navarro (103) and Fenati (93); Bagnaia's win lifted him to fourth on 79, past Bulega (75). CN Francesco Bagnaia (leading) took the win in an amazingly close Moto3 race.