Moto2: Simoncelli dominates in the rain
Marco Simoncelli dominated a wet German Grand Prix to take the lead in the 250cc championship thanks to his third victory of the season
The Gilera rider immediately got accustomed to the difficult conditions and took full advantage of the RSA bike he has finally been given - the same used this year by his Aprilia rivals - to open up a seven-second gap in the first ten laps out of 29.
The Italian, who also dominated qualifying to take pole, didn't have a perfect start when he dropped to fourth place by the first corner, but by the end of the first lap he was already in the lead after overtaking Aprilia's Hector Barbera, Gilera's Fabrizio Lai, and KTM's Julian Simon.
From lap ten onwards Simoncelli maintained a steady gap over the trio comprising Barbera, Simon, and KTM's Mika Kallio, who before this race was the championship leader.
Making up ground on this pursuing group was Aprilia's Alvaro Bautista, who through a bad start dropped from fifth on the grid to 17th by the end of the first lap.
But after the initial laps the Spaniard started his recovery and with six laps to go - when Simoncelli began to control the race by slowing down the pace - he was in the fight for best of the rest, together with the aforementioned bunch and with Aprilia's Mattia Pasini.
In the end, Simoncelli took the chequered flag by a misleading 2.2 seconds over Barbera and Bautista.
Kallio dropped back a bit and finished fourth, 1.7 seconds behind the two Aprilias, with Simon fifth and Pasini sixth.
Aprilia's Thomas Luthi ended the race in seventh after going off on the first lap, one lap before Alex Debon crashed out of fifth place with his Aprilia.
Other crashes included Karel Abraham's Aprilia on lap four, Hiroshi Aoyama's KTM on lap 17 - the Japanese was fifth but rejoins with broken bodywork and classified eighth, Lukas Pesek's Aprilia on lap 20 and Federico Sandi's Aprilia on lap 23.
CLASSIFIED: Pos Rider Bike Time 1. Marco Simoncelli Gilera 45:36.703 2. Hector Barbera Aprilia + 2.257 3. Alvaro Bautista Aprilia + 2.423 4. Mika Kallio KTM + 4.150 5. Julian Simon KTM + 4.846 6. Mattia Pasini Aprilia + 8.132 7. Thomas Luthi Aprilia + 38.302 8. Hiroshi Aoyama KTM + 48.926 9. Yuki Takahashi Honda + 50.062 10. R.Locatelli Gilera + 51.670 11. Alex Baldolini Aprilia +1:08.796 12. Fabrizio Lai Gilera +1:08.962 13. Aleix Espargaro Aprilia +1:11.351 14. Hector Faubel Aprilia +1:11.654 15. Eugene Laverty Aprilia +1:13.856 16. R.Wilairot Honda +1:29.976 17. Imre Toth Aprilia + 1 Lap 18. Alen Gyorfi Honda + 1 Lap 19. D.T.Pradita Yamaha + 1 Lap 20. Toni Wirsing Honda + 2 Laps NOT CLASSIFIED/RETIREMENTS: Rider Bike Laps Federico Sandi Aprilia 22 Lukas Pesek Aprilia 18 Karel Abraham Aprilia 3 Alex Debon Aprilia 3 Manuel Poggiali Gilera 0 Russell Gomez Aprilia 0 FASTEST LAP: Barbera, 1:32.551 on lap 29
Be part of the Autosport community
Join the conversationShare Or Save This Story
Subscribe and access Autosport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
Top Comments