Lorenzo Wins As Marquez Crashes Out

Jun 14, 2015
4 min read

Jorge Lorenzo took his fourth successive victory of 2015 after another lights to flag runaway. The Spaniard got the jump at the start and lead into turn one. His first few laps were greeted with a challenge from Marc Marquez and the Honda kept the Yamaha honest; that was until the Repsol rider ran too hot chasing Lorenzo into turn ten and crashed out, narrowly avoiding wiping out the Movistar bike.

This was a disaster for both Marquez and Valentino Rossi. The Italian needed the Honda to get ahead of his team-mate, because Marquez didn't have the capability to run consistent Lorenzo pace and would have held the Spaniard up for a few laps. Lorenzo was able to build up a 2-second gap and keep his team-mate at a standstill. The gap did plummet to 1.3-seconds with five laps to go, Lorenzo's tyres crying enough. But unlike so many around him he kept upright, and despite Rossi's best efforts he could only get to within just over a second of the win.

This has closed the championship to just 1 point heading into the Dutch TT.

Suzuki's dream Saturday turned into a nightmare Sunday very quickly. The two GSX-RRs were swallowed up at the start, Aleix Espargaro dropping to 9th by turn one and Maverick Vinales 14th. Espargaro began his fightback immediately, though Cal Crutchlow was an unfortunate casualty as the Spaniard steamed up the inside into turn four and forced the CWM LCR Honda rider onto the grass and into retirement. Espargaro had taken 7th from the Pramac Ducati of Yonny Hernandez into turn 1 on the next lap, and by lap six had found himself in 4th. The Honda of Dani Pedrosa ahead pulled away with ease but the Tech 3 Yamaha of Bradley Smith was kept behind by the Spaniard. 4th was looking a good recovery ride but it was all to end with just 5 laps left to run when Espargaro fell at turn 5.

Smith equalled his best MotoGP finish of 2015 with 5th. Team-mate Pol Espargaro's race ended on lap five when he ran wide at turn 3 and lost the front of his YZR-M1.

Maverick Vinales fought his way back up to 6th after putting a good move on the Marc VDS Honda of Scott Redding at turn 4 on lap 16. Redding finished a decent 7th after a troublesome few races.

Evidently Suzuki's engine upgrade didn't end up having much of an effect, acceleration being the big weak point as well as horsepower. They did show that they were able to run a good pace on identical tyres to the other factory teams however, so progress is definitely being made.

Ducati have struggled this weekend with rear-end grip, and it was the rear-end that gave up on Andrea Dovizioso whilst he was running in 3rd. The Italian's race ended after just six laps under breaking for turn 4. He now lies 55 points behind Rossi in the championships. Andrea Iannone salvaged 6th for the Bologna team after darting away from Smith fairly early on. Danilo Petrucci was 9th on the Pramac GP14 and Yonny Hernandez retired on the penultimate lap. Mike Di Meglio was the sole Avintia Ducati representative at the end of the race in 14th.

Stefan Bradl finished as top open runner for the first time this season in his best race since joining the Forward Racing team. The German tested some new electronic settings prior to the race and they look to have helped the 2011 Moto2 world champion get to grips with the open software. He crossed the line 8th whilst team-mate Loris Baz finished 13th.

Alvaro Bautista took Aprilia's first top ten finish in their return season after a very strong ride to 10th. The Aprilia Racing Team Gresini brought a whole raft of updates to the Mugello race two weeks ago and will be hoping to make bigger gains following this week's post-race Barcelona test. Team-mate Marco Melandri retired.

Alex De Angelis took the final point in 15th on the Ioda ART.

2015 Catalan Grand Prix Result:

1st Jorge Lorenzo, Movistar Yamaha MotoGP

2nd Valentino Rossi, Movistar Yamaha MotoGP

3rd Dani Pedrosa, Repsol Honda Team

4th Andrea Iannone, Ducati Team

5th Bradley Smith, Monster Yamaha Tech 3

6th Maverick Vinales, Team Suzuki Ecstar

7th Scott Redding, EG 0,0 Marc VDS Honda

8th Stefan Bradl, Athina Forward Racing Team Yamaha

9th Danilo Petrucci, Octo Pramac Racing Ducati

10th Alvaro Bautista, Aprilia Racing Team Gresini