125cc: Simon takes title with last-lap pass
Julian Simon took victory and the 125cc title with a last-lap pass on team-mate Bradley Smith at the Australian Grand Prix at Phillip Island
Simon bided his time early in the race, riding near the back of the lead group of seven bikes, but soon after Smith took the lead on lap 10 Simon moved his way from fifth to second place.
The two team-mates and title rivals swapped the lead a couple of times over the next few laps before Smith settled in the lead and the duo made a break over the chasing pack, Simon right on Smith's tail.
At the start of the final lap it looked like Smith might have had a comfortable gap, but while Smith was generally quick at the start of the lap, Simon was quicker over the second half and so it proved again, with Simon right on the leader's tail as they exited Siberia.
As they crested Lukey Heights Simon was still there and he dived inside Smith into MG, taking the lead as Smith was left with no choice but to let him through, running wide as he did so. From there there was no stopping Simon, who took the win and clinched the 125cc title as he did so.
Behind them, the battle for third was a close one, as it had been all race, with Sandro Cortese doing a great job to take the place after making a poor start and dropping down the order, firstly having to catch the lead group of seven before then making his way through them.
A whisker behind Cortese in fourth was pole man Pol Espargaro, who led most of the first half of the race before Smith took the lead on lap 10 with Simone Corsi less than two-tenths of a second further back.
Less than a second further back were sixth and seventh place, Nicolas Terol edging out Efren Vazquez by 51 thousandths of a second. The next rider, Andrea Iannone, who had been in the lead pack earlier in the race, was nearly ten seconds behind them.
CLASSIFIED: Pos Rider Bike Time 1. Julian Simon Aprilia 37m55.798s 2. Bradley Smith Aprilia + 0.313s 3. Sandro Cortese Derbi + 2.057s 4. Pol Espargaro Derbi + 2.161s 5. Simone Corsi Aprilia + 2.330s 6. Nicolas Terol Aprilia + 3.239s 7. Efren Vazquez Derbi + 3.290s 8. Andrea Iannone Aprilia + 12.820s 9. Marc Marquez KTM + 22.355s 10. Sergio Gadea Aprilia + 22.602s 11. Scott Redding Aprilia + 29.181s 12. Dominique Aegerter Derbi + 29.199s 13. Danny Webb Aprilia + 29.222s 14. Jonas Folger Aprilia + 29.396s 15. Randy Krummenacher Aprilia + 29.461s 16. Johann Zarco Aprilia + 29.709s 17. Lorenzo Zanetti Aprilia + 31.251s 18. Takaaki Nakagami Aprilia + 32.482s 19. Luis Salom Aprilia + 58.333s 20. Michael Ranseder Aprilia + 58.485s 21. Tomoyoshi Koyama Loncin +1m19.017s 22. Jasper Iwema Honda +1m23.621s 23. Jakub Kornfeil Loncin +1m23.731s 24. Brad Gross Yamaha + 1 lap 25. Luca Vitali Aprilia + 1 lap 26. Luca Marconi Aprilia + 1 lap 27. Andrew Lawson Honda + 1 lap 28. Levi Day Honda + 1 lap NOT CLASSIFIED/RETIREMENTS: Rider Bike Laps Esteve Rabat Aprilia 21 Nicky Diles Aprilia 7 Stefan Bradl Aprilia 2 Joan Olive Derbi 2 Cameron Beaubier KTM 2 FASTEST LAP: Cortese, 1m37.869s on lap 16
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