Jorge «Sprinter» Martín: what a victory for the spaniard in the MotoGP Sprint race at Misano. The spaniard made the most of his pole position and didn’t give anyone a chance to win another race on saturday.
Jorge Martin didn’t let anyone steal his position at the start and held on to first place, with Pecco Bagnaia wasting no time and moving into second place early on after beating Marco Bezzecchi. Dani Pedrosa was fourth and Maverick Viñales fifth.
Brad Binder, widely recognized as a particularly strong rider in the races, was also in good form and was sixth after a double overtake:
Bezzecchi had already «returned» the maneuver to Bagnaia and was second again.
With three laps completed Martin was leading by 0.598s over Bezz, Bagnaia was still in third with 0.825s over the wilcard Pedrosa, at a stage in the race when another battle between Viñales and Binder was anticipated: only 0.098s separated the spaniard from the south african.
However, it wasn’t long before fifth place became a reality for the KTM rider, who was now behind Pedrosa – the austrian manufacturer’s test rider.
That was the top ten with the race just over halfway through:
Binder now joined the group of riders who had already received a warning for exceeding track limits, before Pedrosa – widely regarded as one of the best riders ever – tried to overtake the world championship leader, with the latter defending well.
The race was rapidly approaching its end and with two laps to go Martin was unlikely to let the victory slip away, given his lead over Bezzecchi: 1.019s.
The race at Misano ended shortly afterwards, with Martin securing victory. Joining the spaniard on the podium were Bezzcchi and Bagnaia.