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MOTOGP FIM MOTOGP WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP ROUND 6 / JUNE 2-4, 2017 MUGELLO CIRCUIT / TUSCANY, ITALY P96 MOTO2 As they qualified, so they raced, but not quite in the same order. Franco Morbidelli (EG-VDS Kalex) had snatched pole from teammate Alex Marquez with veteran Mattia Pasini (Italtrans Kalex) a close fourth. Thomas Luthi (CarXpert Kalex) led row two. Morbidelli led away, but both Pasini and Marquez were ahead of him by the end of the first lap, and Luthi also on the sixth. The track has never brought good results for the rider who has won four out of five races so far this year, and he said afterwards, "Today I had to be clever." Meaning he settled for fourth. The front three laid on quite a spectacle, never more than a few inches apart and going at record speed—the lap record go- ing to Luthi on the eighth tour. On lap 16 Marquez took the lead for the first time under brak- ing for the first corner, only for Pasini to take it back again with a fine tactical swoop through the right-left Casanova-Savelli corner set. This more or less set the tone, with every effort by his pursuers being repulsed. The last lap was a thriller. Now it was Luthi's turn to pounce into the first corner, narrowly hang- ing on through the next uphill corners as Marquez also pushed past. Pasini, whose last GP win was at this track on a 250 Aprilia in 2009 when he defeated the late Marco Simoncelli, was not to be denied. Through Casanova-Savelli he repeated his move on Marquez. Then he pushed inside Luthi into the next right-hander, Arrabbiata 1, to lead again. For the rest of the lap he held off every offen- sive, and the three crossed the line within 0.136 of a second. Morbidelli was a safe fourth, Miguel Oliveira (Red Bull KTM) equally alone in fifth. Behind them there was an all- action pack, with more overtak- ing than anyone could remem- ber in this often-processional intermediate class. Hot-stuff rookie Pecco Bag- naia (SKY VR46 Kalex) had led it midrace but had lost three places and had started moving forward again when he crashed out on the last lap. Rossi's half-brother Luca Marini (Forward Kalex) had been disputing the front of it with Simone Corsi (Speed Up); but all the while Dominique Aegerter (Kiefer Suter) had been making his way forward with increasing speed as the fuel load burned Mattia Pasini "rode the race every Italian rider dreams of," according to Valentino Rossi.