The Italian Andrea Iannone (Ducati Desmosedici GP16) achieved his first victory in the MotoGP category by winning the Austrian Grand Prix of the category that was held today, Sunday, at the Red Bull circuit in the town of Spielberg, in which the Italian manufacturer achieved its first win since 2010.
It was at the 2010 Australian Grand Prix and the Australian Casey Stoner, present this weekend at the Ducati workshops, that they achieved their last grand prix victory and at Red Bull they were able to celebrate it twice by winning the second place on the podium Andrea Dovizioso.
The Spanish Marc Márquez (Repsol Honda RC 213 V), leader of the world championship of the specialty, maintains the first position with 181 points, thanks to the fifth place in Austria, with 43 points of advantage over Lorenzo and 57 over Rossi.
The Ducati of Andrea Iannone and Andrea Dovizioso did not disappoint at the start, in which both were placed in front, with Valentino Rossi just behind them, but also Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha YZR M 1) and Marc Márquez (Repsol Honda RC 213 V).
At that moment, when the traffic light went off, up to five riders went ahead at the start and the British Cal Cruchtlow (Honda RC 213 V), the German Stefan Bradl (Aprilia RS-GP) had to make a pass through the workshop street. , the Colombian Yonny Hernández (Ducati Desmosedici GP14.2) and the Spanish Álvaro Bautista (Aprilia RS-GP) and Héctor Barberá (Ducati Desmosedici GP14.2).
At the head Iannone tried to consolidate his leadership attacked by Valentino Rossi, who got to put first, but the power and maximum speed of the Ducati quickly returned everything to its original situation and the errors in the hasty braking at the end of the straight were more than expected in the initial laps.
The situation did not change much with the passage of the laps as the two Ducati of Iannone and Dovizioso were in charge of setting the pace, pursued by the Yamaha of Lorenzo and Rossi, with Marc Márquez stuck in their wake, as well as Maverick Viñales (Suzuki GSX -RR), while all the pilots sanctioned at the start went through the workshop street, except for the Spanish Héctor Barberá, who did not notice the sanction and continued in the race, which in the end led to disqualification when he was seventh .
Dovizioso surpassed his teammate Iannone in the responsibility of setting the pace and both were gradually increasing the differences with the Yamaha riders, who did the same with Márquez, partly as a consequence of going long in a corner, and Viñales , although the distances did not become definitive almost at no time in the leading quartet until the last third of it.
The high temperatures and the passage of laps meant that the two Ducati riders, always with Dovizioso at the head, reached more than a second ahead with eight laps remaining and one lap later Andrea Iannone took the initiative to look for his first victory with the Ducati, with the Yamaha riders surrendered to the evidence of the superiority of their rivals on the Red Bull circuit.
Iannone set his fastest race lap in the twenty-fourth lap in a clear attempt to detach himself from his teammate and almost at the same time that the Spanish Aleix Espargaró had to take the road from his workshop with technical problems in his Suzuki GSX-RR, with which he rolled in eighth position.
Iannone’s pull was effective as he achieved enough difference to never be disturbed again on the way to his first victory in the category, ahead of Andrea Dovizioso and Jorge Lorenzo, who knew how to keep his team at bay at all times. teammate Valentino Rossi.
Marc Márquez finished in fifth position, a good result after the severe accident he suffered in the third free practice sessions and after overcoming many problems with the performance of his Repsol Honda, which was significantly lower than its competition on this track.
After Márquez Maverick Viñales and Dani Pedrosa (Repsol Honda RC 213 V) finished, but now far from the leading group, with Pol Espargaró (Yamaha YZR M 1), tenth and Esteve «Tito» Rabat (Honda RC 213 V), also in the points, fourteenth, not so Álvaro Bautista (Aprilia RS-GP), who was sixteenth. EFE