Local stars Dani Pedrosa (Repsol Honda RC213V) and Marc Marquez (Repsol Honda RC213V) finished second and third in this afternoon’s Catalan Grand Prix at Catalunya, a race run in sweltering conditions that turned into something of an exercise in tyre management.

The team-mates chased Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha) throughout, spending most of the 25 laps less than half a second behind the reigning World Champion, who stretched his advantage in the final few laps to win by just 1.7 seconds.

Pedrosa’s second successive runner-up result – following wins at Jerez and Le Mans – means he retains the World Championship lead, with a seven-point advantage over Lorenzo at one-third distance in the 18-round series.

Pedrosa started his 200th Grand Prix from pole position, also for the second race in a row, but was edged out in the race to the first corner by Lorenzo, with MotoGP rookie Marquez slotting into third after an excellent start from the second row of the grid. The trio stayed in those positions throughout, but they were so close, with the gaps changing by tenths or even hundredths of a second each lap, that the tension remained.

In the early stages Pedrosa was comfortable running Lorenzo’s pace but when he tried to step up his rhythm to attack he found himself on the limit with front grip. So he waited patiently for the fuel load to go down to ease the issue but he never had enough speed into the corners to try for the lead, even though he altered his position on the bike to ease the load on the front tyre.

Then in the closing stages Marquez – who had set the fastest lap of the race on lap three – began to challenge his team-mate for second. The reigning Moto2 champ came closest to getting past with two laps to go, when he got inside Pedrosa at Turn Four, only to suffer a major front-end moment. He performed a miracle to stay on and even then didn’t give up the chase, crossing the line a mere 0.063 seconds down on Pedrosa.

Stefan Bradl (LCR Honda RC213V) backed up his fourth-place finish at Mugello – a result that equalled his career-best in the premier class – with a good ride to fifth. He spent much of the race riding with Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati), whom he beat at Mugello after a fearsome end-of-race encounter.

MotoGP rookie Bryan Staring (GO&FUN Honda Gresini FTR Honda) was happy to score his first points in the championship, with a 14th place finish in tricky conditions.

Alvaro Bautista (Team GO&FUN Honda Gresini RC213V) had another bitterly disappointing day, sliding off at Turn Ten on the first lap after losing the front. He was challenging Valentino Rossi (Yamaha) at the time. Two weeks ago at Mugello the Spaniard and the Italian both crashed out after colliding on the first lap of the race.

Bautista was far from the only man to hit the gravel today. The baking hot conditions caused grip worries for many riders after the first few laps. In all, seven of the 24 starters crashed out.

MotoGP riders now have a busy few days of testing here at Catalunya and then at Motorland Aragon. The racing continues in two weeks with the Dutch TT at Assen on Saturday 29 June.


Dani Pedrosa, Repsol Honda: 2nd

“Today was a bit of a strange race. We could not get maximum performance and physically it was very hard, because of the heat of the bike and the tyres. When I tried to open the throttle the bike wobbled in the front and I had to be very careful. We three frontrunners were battling the track conditions today. It was a bit disappointing not to be able to push more, since the differences between us all was minimal. We rode practically the entire race without any overtaking. It was very easy to make a mistake and, in fact, in the closing laps, Marc [Marquez] made one and I had a slide, but in the end we were able to take a very important second place. We expected to do better after yesterday, but we now have an extra twenty points and we continue to lead the standings.”

Marc Marquez, Repsol Honda: 3rd

“It was a difficult race. We expected it to be tough, but we never imagined that we would be fighting for the podium with Jorge [Lorenzo] and Dani [Pedrosa] and I’m very happy with this result! It gives us confidence after a slightly tricky weekend, as in the end we found the ideal set-up. During the race I learned a lot from riding behind Dani, trying to figure out how to ride a MotoGP bike at this track, and in the end we did quite well. We knew it would be difficult to finish in the top five, but we managed to get on the podium. I can only say I’m thrilled with the result. Now we look to Assen and we’ll see if we can improve anything for that race during the test at Aragon.”

Stefan Bradl, LCR Honda MotoGP: 5th

“Honestly we thought it was going to be tough to get such a good result, so we are very happy about this fifth place. It was a very tough race in hot conditions and I had to be very clever to save the tyres every single lap. Some riders crashed in the early stages, so I decided to be less aggressive in the beginning. I am quite satisfied about my performance because I was capable of adapting to these difficult conditions. This strategy gave me a lot of confidence and a big gap to the guys behind me. Tomorrow we will be back on track for a half-day test here and then two days at Aragon.”

Alvaro Bautista, Team GO&FUN Honda Gresini: DNF

“It is such a shame. We have had a great weekend and this was the last thing we needed. After the start I felt like the guys in front of me were holding me up and in an effort to stay with the lead group I tried to get past them and I crashed. Maybe with a hard tyre on the front I could have been a bit more careful but I was worried about losing touch and I went for it. In hindsight it would have been better to wait but in racing these things happen. I feel sorry for the team because they have done a great job here and I want to apologise to all the guys, who are giving 100% and deserve a different result. Now we just have to look forward to the next race and try to stay calm.”

Bryan Staring, GO&FUN Honda Gresini: 14th

“I scored my first World Championship points today but I am still not particularly happy because I would have liked to do it more on the front foot. It wasn’t an easy race because of the conditions and I was able to improve my pace from qualifying so that’s good but I’m still not happy to be honest. Anyway, we have to take the positives and try to learn from this experience in the future.”

Event results - Round 6 - Race 1

1 Jorge Lorenzo 43m06.479s SPA YAMAHA Yamaha Factory Racing
2 Dani Pedrosa 1.763 SPA HONDA Repsol Honda Team
3 Marc Marquez 1.826 ESP HONDA Repsol Honda Team
4 Valentino Rossi 5.874 ITA YAMAHA Yamaha Factory Racing
5 Stefan Bradl 26.756 GER HONDA LCR Honda MotoGP
6 Bradley Smith 32.228 GBR YAMAHA Monster Yamaha Tech 3
7 Andrea Dovizioso 32.692 ITA DUCATI Ducati Team
8 Aleix Espargaro 58.615 ESP ART Power Electronics Aspar
9 Colin Edwards 1'03.142 USA FTR NGM Forward Racing
10 Michele Pirro 1'09.774 ITA DUCATI Ignite Pramac Racing
11 Danilo Petrucci 1'24.377 ITA IODA Came IodaRacing Project
12 Claudio Corti 1'33.679 ITA FTR NGM Forward Racing
13 Yonny Hernandez 1'45.355 COL ART Paul Bird Motorsport
14 Bryan Staring 1'50.745 AUS HONDA Go & Fun Honda Gresini
15 Javier del Amor 1 Lap ESP FTR Avintia Blusens
16 Lukas Pesek 1 Lap CZE IODA Came IodaRacing Project
17 Hector Barbera DNF SPA FTR Avintia Blusens
18 Karel Abraham DNF CZE ART Cardion AB Motoracing
19 Cal Crutchlow DNF GBR YAMAHA Monster Yamaha Tech 3
20 Nicky Hayden DNF USA DUCATI Ducati Team
21 Andrea Iannone DNF ITA DUCATI Ignite Pramac Racing
22 Randy De Puniet DNF FRA ART Power Electronics Aspar
23 Alvaro Bautista DNF SPA HONDA Go & Fun Honda Gresini
24 Michael Laverty DNF WAL ART Paul Bird Motorsport


Championship standings

1 Dani Pedrosa 123 pts SPA HONDA Repsol Honda Team
2 Jorge Lorenzo 116 pts SPA YAMAHA Yamaha Factory Racing
3 Marc Marquez 93 pts ESP HONDA Repsol Honda Team
4 Cal Crutchlow 71 pts GBR YAMAHA Monster Yamaha Tech 3
5 Valentino Rossi 60 pts ITA YAMAHA Yamaha Factory Racing
6 Andrea Dovizioso 59 pts ITA DUCATI Ducati Team
7 Nicky Hayden 45 pts USA DUCATI Ducati Team
8 Stefan Bradl 41 pts GER HONDA LCR Honda MotoGP
9 Alvaro Bautista 38 pts SPA HONDA Go & Fun Honda Gresini
10 Aleix Espargaro 36 pts ESP ART Power Electronics Aspar
11 Bradley Smith 34 pts GBR YAMAHA Monster Yamaha Tech 3
12 Michele Pirro 28 pts ITA DUCATI Ignite Pramac Racing
13 Andrea Iannone 21 pts ITA DUCATI Ignite Pramac Racing
14 Hector Barbera 13 pts SPA FTR Avintia Blusens
15 Danilo Petrucci 13 pts ITA IODA Came IodaRacing Project
16 Randy De Puniet 11 pts FRA ART Power Electronics Aspar
17 Colin Edwards 10 pts USA FTR NGM Forward Racing
18 Ben Spies 9 pts USA DUCATI Ignite Pramac Racing
19 Yonny Hernandez 6 pts COL ART Paul Bird Motorsport
20 Claudio Corti 4 pts ITA FTR NGM Forward Racing
21 Michael Laverty 3 pts WAL ART Paul Bird Motorsport
22 Karel Abraham 2 pts CZE ART Cardion AB Motoracing
23 Bryan Staring 2 pts AUS HONDA Go & Fun Honda Gresini
24 Javier del Amor 1 pts ESP FTR Avintia Blusens
25 Hiroshi Aoyama 1 pts JPN FTR Avintia Blusens
26 Lukas Pesek 0 pts CZE IODA Came IodaRacing Project
27 Blake Young 0 pts USA APRILIA Attack Performance

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