Suzuki’s Joan Mir secured his first win of the season at the European GP and increased his lead over Fabio Quartararo by 37 points for the 2020 world title.
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Joan Mir secured his first win of the season and is the ninth different premier class winner this year
Team Suzuki Ecstar rider Joan Mir took his maiden MotoGP win at the European Grand Prix. The dramatic victory extends the Suzuki driver’s lead in the championship battle by 37 points on SRT’s Fabio Quartararo, who fell back from the top positions after a fall. With the win, Mir also becomes the ninth different winner of the season. Meanwhile, teammate Alex Rins took second place on the podium, followed by Pol Espargaro on the factory KTM.
Also read: MotoGP: Pol Espargaro takes pole in wet qualifying for the European GP
Espargaro started from pole position and maintained the lead when the lights turned green, followed by LCR Honda’s Rins and Takaaki Nakagami. Quartararo jumped from P11 to ninth on the first lap to overtake Aleix Espargaro on the factory Aprilia, but both drivers crashed. Still, Quartararo returned to the race 15 seconds behind the rest of the field.
Alex Rins led the race briefly after overtaking Pol Espargaro on lap 2, only to be overtaken by his teammate two laps later
Rins made his first move on Pol Espargaro to take the lead on Turn 11 of Lap 2, pushing the Pole man into second place while fifth-starter Mir had advanced to P3 and was about to overtake Espargaro. He had the chance to start a race dominated by Suzuki on lap 4. It was a fight between teammates back then as Rins defended the lead in front of Mir while Espargaro left the duo behind.
Rins eventually made a mistake on lap 17 at Turn 11 that allowed Mir to get through and take the lead he held until the end of the race. The championship leader immediately built up a gap of half a second and crossed the checkered flag 0.651s behind Rins. Suzuki secured his second 1-2 place in a Grand Prix since 1982 while Espargaro finished on the podium, 1.203 seconds behind the leader.
Pol Espargaro drove closely with the Suzuki and secured a podium after a fantastic performance
In fourth place, Nakagami was the fastest of the Honda riders, followed by Miguel Oliveira on the Tech 3 KTM. Jack Miller from Pramac took P6, Brad Binder on the factory KTM was P7. Ducati’s Andrea Dovizioso landed on P8 ahead of Avintia’s Johann Zarco and Ducati rider Danilo Petrucci, who completed the top ten.
Franco Morbidelli on the SRT finished the race in P11, ahead of Honda’s Stefan Bradl in P12 and the only surviving factory Honda after Alex Marquez crashed on lap 24 of the race. After his fall on the first lap, Quartararo recovered and finished 14th behind Maverick Vinales on the factory Yamaha.
On the podium – Joan Mir, Alex Rins and Pol Espargaro
In his first race since recovering from COVID-19, Valentino Rossi had a disappointing run after a technical problem forced him to retire. Meanwhile, the European GP saw a number of crashes including LCR’s Cal Crutchlow, Pramac rider Francesco Bagnaia, Aleix Espargaro on Aprilia while Avintia’s Tito Rabat faced a technical problem.
Photo credit: Eurosport
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