Lorenzo Czechmates his rivals at Brno GP
SPANIARD Jorge Lorenzo won the Czech MotoGP in Brno from pole position on Sunday to move level with Valentino Rossi at the top of the world championship standings.
The 28-year-old Yamaha rider dominated the race to take victory more than four seconds ahead of his compatriot Marc Marquez with Italian Rossi in third.
“Luckily, I had a little bit more pace than Marc and won this very important victory because now I’m leading the championship with Valentino,” Lorenzo told reporters after his fifth victory of the season.
Any hopes of a dramatic three-way battle between Lorenzo, Marquez and Rossi were dashed almost immediately, as Rossi got bogged down at the start. The Italian, starting from third on the grid, had worked hard during practice and qualifying to ensure that he didn’t let Marquez and Lorenzo disappear at the start of the race as in Indianapolis. It was all to be for nothing though, as he found himself down in fifth at the first corner.
Lorenzo and Marquez im- mediately opened a gap at the front, which had increased to over two seconds by the time Rossi found a way past Ducati’s Andrea Dovizioso. Gambling on harder-compound tyres than the two leaders, Rossi was unable to match their pace and gradually fell back.
Lorenzo went on to take his 38th MotoGP victory by the comfortable margin of 4.4 seconds from Marquez. Rossi eventually crossed the line 10.4 secs behind Lorenzo to finish third, continuing his run of having finished on the podium at every race this season.
Lorenzo, the 2010 and 2012 world champion, is level in the overall standings on 211 points with team-mate Rossi, 52 points ahead of Honda’s Marquez, the reigning double champion. There are still seven rounds left in the championship, with the next stop being the British MotoGP at Donington on August 30.
- Reuters