Moto2: Simoncelli takes dramatic home win

The two, who led the last two thirds of the 21-lap race after Alvaro Bautista threw it away in a crash, had been exchanging positions for the last three laps, with Aprilia's Barbera letting through Simoncelli's less powerful Gilera and then taking the position back.

But Simoncelli, about to cross in first place the start/finish line for the penultimate time, swerved suddenly on the long Mugello straight to try and prevent Barbera from catching the slipstream, without noticing the latter's front wheel was so close to his own rear.

The unprotected front brake lever on the Aprilia clashed with Simoncelli's body and sent the former in a high-speed cartwheel that threw Barbera tumbling down the straight and hitting the right-hand side barriers, luckily with no consequences.

The Spaniard was lucky that the Aprilias of Thomas Luthi and Alex Debon, running in third and fourth respectively, were over three seconds behind. The two finished the race just half a second behind Simoncelli, after exchanging positions once more between themselves.

Championship leader Mika Kallio kept out of trouble with his KTM and ended in a lonely fourth place, after teammate Hiroshi Aoyama, who ran with him for most of the race, suffered a problem on the last lap and dropped back to eighth place.

Italy's Mattia Pasini finished in fifth place with his Aprilia ahead of compatriot Roberto Locatelli's Gilera in sixth and Karel Abraham's Aprilia in seventh.

Aprilia's Aleix Espargaro took ninth while Ratthapark Wilairot was the top Honda rider in tenth.

Lap ten saw Hector Faubel crashing into retirement from eighth place, followed seconds later by Lukas Pesek and Manuel Poggiali both sliding off and retiring at the Correntaio curve while running in fifth and ninth position respectively.

Yuki Takahashi also retired while running fifth with less than four laps to go of the race.

Pos  Rider             Bike     Time
 1.  Marco Simoncelli  Gilera   40:19.910
 2.  Alex Debon        Aprilia  +   0.499
 3.  Thomas Luthi      Aprilia  +   0.712
 4.  Mika Kallio       KTM      +   7.403
 5.  Mattia Pasini     Aprilia  +  12.542
 6.  R.Locatelli       Gilera   +  12.790
 7.  Karel Abraham     Aprilia  +  16.114
 8.  Hiroshi Aoyama    KTM      +  17.316
 9.  Aleix Espargaro   Aprilia  +  19.642
10.  R.Wilairot        Honda    +  19.704
11.  Julian Simon      KTM      +  19.751
12.  Alex Baldolini    Aprilia  +  47.360
13.  Eugene Laverty    Aprilia  +  47.422
14.  Fabrizio Lai      Gilera   +1:13.423
15.  Imre Toth         Aprilia  +1:25.891
16.  Russell Gomez     Aprilia  +1:36.557
17.  D.T.Pradita       Yamaha   +1:48.224

Retirements:

    Rider             Bike     Laps
    Hector Barbera    Aprilia  19
    Yuki Takahashi    Honda    17
    Lukas Pesek       Aprilia  9
    Hector Faubel     Aprilia  9
    Manuel Poggiali   Gilera   9
    Alvaro Bautista   Aprilia  6