125cc: Gadea snatches victory in Qatar
Sergio Gadea snatched victory in the season-opening 125cc Grand Prix of Qatar, the first ever night race of the world motorcycling championship
The Aspar Aprilia rider crossed the line first less than a second ahead of a pack of four riders who fought tooth and nail for the last five laps of the race, Gadea having taken the lead for the final time with just under two laps to the chequered flag.
The pack of riders comprised Derbi's Joan Olive in second, Aprilia's Stefan Bradl in third, Derbi's Mike di Meglio in fourth, and Aprilia's Scott Redding in fifth.
One of the big disappointments of the race befell Briton Bradley Smith who, after starting the race from pole and leading the first lap and a half of the race, appeared to suffer some mechanical gremlins with his Aprilia, which saw him fade down the order and finish in a lowly 16th place.
Reigning champion Gabor Talmacsi, who led most of the race, also saw his chance of victory thwarted by mechanical problems when he disappeared from the leading pack with four laps remaining. The Hungarian ultimately had to settle for 12th place on his Aprilia.
With three laps to go KTM's Raffaele de Rosa, who was also in the leading pack, clipped Olive's rear wheel as he made an optimistic move and crashed, nearly taking the Spaniard with him.
Sixth place went to Aprilia's Daniel Webb, followed by Aprilia's Simone Corsi in seventh, Derbi's Pol Espargaro in eighth, Aprilia's Efren Vazquez in ninth, and Aprilia's Nicolas Terol rounding up the top ten.
Classified: Pos Rider Make Time 1. Sergio Gadea Aprilia 38:09.444 2. Joan Olive Derbi + 0.932 3. Stefan Bradl Aprilia + 1.660 4. Mike Di Meglio Derbi + 1.771 5. Scott Redding Aprilia + 1.819 6. Daniel Webb Aprilia + 7.689 7. Simone Corsi Aprilia + 8.684 8. Pol Espargaro Derbi + 8.693 9. Efren Vazquez Aprilia + 9.054 10. Nicolas Terol Aprilia + 10.902 11. Sandro Cortese Aprilia + 10.945 12. Gabor Talmacsi Aprilia + 12.618 13. Stefano Bianco Aprilia + 12.709 14. Andrea Iannone Aprilia + 20.086 15. Michael Ranseder Aprilia + 23.575 16. Bradley Smith Aprilia + 23.890 17. D.Agerter Derbi + 29.406 18. Pablo Nieto KTM + 32.891 19. Takaaki Nakagami Aprilia + 33.346 20. Pere Tutusaus Aprilia + 33.649 21. Lorenzo Zanetti KTM + 36.696 22. R.Krummenacher KTM + 36.754 23. Robin Lasser Aprilia + 45.317 24. Esteve Rabat KTM + 56.440 25. Louis Rossi Honda +1:14.502 Not classified: Rider Make On lap Raffaele De Rosa KTM 15 Dino Lombardi Aprilia 11 H.van den Berg Aprilia 10 Tomoyoshi Koyama KTM 8 Steve Bonsey Aprilia 5 R.Lacalendola Aprilia 1 Robert Muresan Aprilia - Fastest lap: Redding, 2:05.695 on lap 7
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