The King of the Ring is back! After suffering from a horrific injury last year, Marc Marquez returned to winning ways at the Sachsenring after 17 months to win the German Grand Prix for the 11th time in a row. Here are the highlights of the Liqui Moly Motorrad Grand Prix.
MEN WHO SHINED
Marc Marquez displayed one of the most emotional comebacks of all time as he won the German Grand Prix at Sachsenring and marked his first MotoGP victory and podium this season, ending Honda’s longest win drought. The victory gave Marquez his 11th consecutive win at the Sachsenring (unbeaten in the ring since 2009) and his first win in 581 days! The Spanish Grand Prix winner, Miguel Oliviera continued his good run and did everything to close down the gap between him and Marquez in the latter stages of the race but just could not catch the King, while Championship leader Fabio Quartararo extended his lead at the top of the standings with a solid P3 finish. It was a good day for KTM as their other rider, Brad Binder who started the race P13 displayed one of his best performances of this season with a brilliant overtake on Ducati rider Jack Miller and Aleix Espargaro as he brought his KTM home in fourth spot. The battle for P5 was frantic with Francesco Bagnaia getting the better of Jack Miller who finished 6th and it also marked a decent weekend for Aprilia with Aleix Espargaro crossing the line P7. Despite starting the race on pole, Johann Zarco struggled for pace and kept dropping positions but did just enough to seal P8 ahead of Joan Mir, with Pol Espargaro rounding out the top ten.
MEN WHO LEFT US WANTING MORE
Franco Morbidelli and Maverick Vinales continue their poor racing form with both of them finishing P18 and P19 respectively. While Marc Marquez won the race, his brother Alex Marquez made contact with the KTM of Daniel Petrucci which resulted in both the riders crashing their bikes going into turn 1. Petrucci was fuming at his own teammate Iker Lecuona after the race as he said,” the problem was that he (Alex Marquez) braked hard as Lecuona did. Lecuona for me, did really some stupid moves in the few laps, because everyone was waiting, we were all in a row. Iker still continues to be so aggressive in the first laps and then finishes the race last”.
STANDINGS
Riders:
Fabio Quartararo’s (131) third-place finish meant that he extended his championship lead to 22 points ahead of Ducati’s Johann Zarco who is on 109 points. Jack Miller remains third on the leaderboard with 100 points with Pecco Bagnaia closing the gap to just a single point in 4th. In fifth spot is defending MotoGP Champion Joan Mir (85) who is just 14 points behind Bagnaia while a poor race from Maverick Vinales saw him stuck on 75 points in 6th. A third consecutive podium finish helped Portuguese rider, Miguel Oliviera close the gap between him and Vinales to just a point with teammate Brad Binder (56) just behind with rapidly increasing pace. After crossing the line in P7, Aleix Esparago finds himself on 53 points and finally it’s Marc Marquez who’s race win takes him inside the top ten with 41 points for the first time this season.
Constructors:
Yamaha reclaimed their lead at the top with 159 points, just five ahead of Ducati who are second. A brilliant race from Miguel Oliviera and Brad Binder for KTM saw them close their 60-point gap with the top two to 51 points and also leave Suzuki fourteen points behind them. It was a long win drought for Honda but they are finally back to winning ways and a change in their aero department paid off as they moved to 77 points and now find themselves 22 points clear of Aprilia who sits last on the table.
MotoGP will now travel to the incredible Dutch TT at Assen which takes place next weekend which marks the last race before the MotoGP summer break.
[All Images Credit: MotoGP]
Shashank Iyer