PH2: Mugello MotoGP
Monday 16th July 2012
Lorenzo wins, but it's time for musical saddles as Moto GP riders sort out their 2013 seats
The big Mugello news was Dani Pedrosa signing up to partner Marc Marquez in the factory HRC team for the next two years. The 2013 season promises to be quite entertaining at Honda, especially if Marc starts sticking it to Dani on track.
Two Spaniards vying for top spot...pass the handbags... But where does that leave Rossi? The smart money is on Vale staying with Ducati for a year or two more, most likely alongside Britain's Cal Crutchlow. The factory Yamaha team looks like Jorge Lorenzo and Texan Ben Spies, something that must really upset Andrea Dovizioso, especially as Ben is suffering a bit of a crisis of confidence on track...
At the sharp end only Dani Pedrosa looked able to stay near Jorge on track, but after building up a gap of more than a second, it was pretty unlikely that Jorge would ever give it up. And sure enough he didn't, winning the race by a fair distance from Dani in second. Third went to Dovi, ahead of the seriously impressive looking Stefan Bradl - just. How good was that last lap? Fifth for Rossi was a great result and sixth for Cal wasn't bad - although his season has been so good for Cal so far we kind of expect better. Stoner's eighth was little less than a disaster for the Aussie.
In Moto2 it was great to see Bradley Smith up at the sharp end. Despite destroying his new more aerodynamic fairing during practice, Bradders still rode a cracking race to finish fourth with Scott Redding in sixth. Andrea 'Crazy Joe' Iannone won, with Pol Espargaro in second and Thomas Luthi in third. Runaway championship leader Marquez seemed a little off-colour back in fifth place. Mind you, he does have a factory contract in his back pocket; it much have been weighing the little chap down...
Moto3 was always going to be a battle of the slipstreams at Mugello and, true to form, a seven-bike dice soon ensued with Brit Danny Kent well in the battle and actually hitting the front on lap nine. Despite Maverick Vinales, Romano Fenati and Sandro Cortese breaking clear with six to go they still set up a grandstand finish.
Vinales snatched the lead and win by a wheel from local hero Fenati with Cortese in third and only 0.071 seconds between them all. Kent finished a strong fifth with Danny Webb in 20th spot.
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