Marquez matches Stoner and Doohan
Five wins in a row for the Spanish wiz, who now holds a 43-point championship lead over Dani Pedrosa. And how good was Aussie Jack Miller in Moto3?MotoGP
Has a safety car ever won a race? These days it's a regular occurrence: that's what Spanish fans are calling Marc Marquez – because all the others have to line up behind him. Marquez started from pole for the sixth successive time: the last rider to do that was Australia's Casey Stoner in his Ducati heyday back in 2008. It didn't help Marquez at first: an unusually tentative start, in which he confessed to making "a few mistakes”, saw the Repsol Honda drop back on the opening laps to run in 10th place.
The early leader was Ducati's Andrea Dovizioso, with Stefan Bradl's LCR Honda in hot pursuit. But within four laps it was Valentino Rossi, making his 299th grand prix start, who took control while Dani Pedrosa on the other works Honda and Rossi's Yamaha teammate Jorge Lorenzo struggled to stay in the top 10.
By lap 13 – one lap before half-distance – Marquez had hit the front.
"I overtake every rider one by one,” beamed the Spaniard succinctly, after he equalled Mick Doohan's 1997 record of six successive wins from pole position. "I'm very happy – I hadn't expected a race like that.”
Marquez repeatedly dived under the man ahead of him at the Dunlop Chicane, setting a new Le Mans lap record of 1:33.548 on lap eight to end up winning by just under a second-and-a-half as Rossi accelerated to cover his own pursuers.
With Rossi comfortable in second, interest focused on the battle for third. It went to an ecstatic Alvaro Bautista, the 29-year-old claiming only his third MotoGP podium on the GO&FUN Honda Gresini bike ahead of surprise package Pol Espargaro. The younger brother of Aleix started from the front row and brought his Monster Tech 3 Yamaha home in fourth ahead of Pedrosa and Lorenzo.
Pedrosa, possibly still suffering the effects of arm pump surgery after Jerez, finished fifth, off the podium for the first time this season… The first casualty of the 28-lap race was Nicky Hayden, who fell on the opening lap, followed shortly afterwards by Hector Barbera and Andrea Iannone… Australia's Broc Parkes on the PBM was 18th of the 19 classified finishers.
Moto2
Score two for the old guy: 31-year-old Finnish veteran Mika Kallio took his second successive victory and the 17th of his 202-race career to move within seven points of the championship lead held by his Marc VDS Racing colleague Tito Rabat.
Kallio took advantage of a slight hesitation by long-time leader Simone Corsi to snatch the lead two-thirds of the way through the 26-lap race and won it comfortably.
Like polesitter Jonas Folger, Rabat seemed to struggle for early pace but finished strongly to limit the damage to his title hopes, while Aussie Ant West came home 14th on the QMMF Speed Up after starting 27th – the number of points he now has in 11th place overall.
Moto3
Aussie Jack Miller made a brilliant return to the podium with his third victory of the year at Le Mans. Outgunned by his Honda rivals, and especially Efren Vazquez, on the two straights on the Circuit Bugatti, the 19-year-old on the Red Bull Ajo KTM late-braked his way to a powerful victory that included a vigorous chop across the bows of Vazquez a few corners from the finish.
A disgruntled Vazquez, who started from his first pole position in his 111th race, pushed Miller in the back on the slow-down lap but the championship leader was having none of it.
"I only did to him what he did to me earlier in the race,” shrugged Miller, who now enjoys a 30-point advantage over Romano Fenati. The Italian, winner of the last two rounds in Argentina and Spain, retired his SKY VR46 KTM at three-quarter distance.
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