Spain’s Jorge Lorenzo won the Czech Republic MotoGP race in Brno yesterday to level Yamaha teammate Valentino Rossi at the top of the overall championship standings after 11 out of 18 races.
Fellow Spaniard Marc Marquez, the reigning champion and winner of the previous two races, finished second ahead of Rossi.
Lorenzo clocked 42 minutes, 53.042 seconds on the 22 laps of the 5.4km circuit, finishing 4.462 seconds ahead of Honda’s Marquez and 10.397 seconds clear of Rossi.
Photo: AFP
Both Lorenzo and Rossi have 211 points at the top of the overall standings, but Lorenzo has won five races this season against three wins for the Italian superstar.
Marquez in third has 159 points following a lackluster start to the season.
“Luckily I had a little more pace than Marc and I could win this very important victory for the championship,” Lorenzo said. “Now I lead the championship with Valentino and for Marc, it is more difficult now to recover.”
The first non-Honda rider to win at Brno since his own victory here in 2010, Lorenzo already dominated the free practice sessions in the southern Czech city before smashing the circuit record in qualifying on Saturday.
On a hot, dry afternoon, the 28-year-old led all the way from pole position, with Marquez nestled in right behind him.
However, unlike at Indianapolis in the previous race, Marquez never got a chance to get past Lorenzo, who gradually started to broaden the gap.
Riding on two medium compound tires, Lorenzo said he “was a bit worried at the end of the race” as the bike slid in traction, forcing him to “be careful with the throttle.”
Marquez said that “it was really difficult to win the race” given Lorenzo’s pace.
“In the beginning I tried to follow [Lorenzo] and I knew that with the new tires I could do it the first five or six laps, but when the tires dropped, we struggled with the grip. I just forgot about Jorge and tried to keep the distance with Valentino. Today we did the maximum. I am happy for the result,” Marquez said.
Rossi, who has made it on to the podium in all races so far this season, got off to a poor start, losing two positions from third on the grid as Lorenzo and Marquez sped ahead.
“Unfortunately my start was bad and I lost some time in the first laps,” said the 36-year-old, who has won nine championship titles across all categories.
“Jorge and Marc were faster than me and I was a bit in trouble to ride the bike so I tried to push, but I was not fast and strong enough to stay with them,” he added, refusing to blame his choice of the hard tire option on both wheels.
“I chose the best tire for me during the practice, not to go faster in the second half of the race,” Rossi said.
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