What’s life without drama they say! And the 2016 MotoGP season-opener provided quite a bit of that and more. In the end, Jorge Lorenzo continued from where he had left off last season and produced a comfortable win in the end to launch his title defence in style. In second place was Ducati rider Andrea Dovizioso and a close third was Marc Marquez.
Valentino Rossi managed to finish fourth and grab some valuable points.


Lorenzo (centre) finished ahead of Ducati rider Andrea Dovizioso (left) and Repsol Honda’s Marc Marquez.

But the results don’t give an inkling of the plethora of action that happened during the race. Lorenzo took the lead at the start while Marquez had a bad start and dropped to fifth. But at the end of the first lap, the Ducatis showed their prowess down the straight, and Iannone and Andrea Dovizioso zoomed past the Yamaha rider.
Iannone, who came under pressure after being overtaken by Dovizioso, crashed in the sixth lap, bringing his race to a premature end. Lorenzo was then able to overtake Dovizioso in the eighth lap and didn’t relinquish the lead after that. The battle for second was keenly contested in the closing laps with Marquez overtaking Dovizioso in the 18th lap but the Italian was able to regain the position in the last lap and then relied on his straight line speed to grab the second spot on the podium.
This is a great start to the season for Lorenzo and he attributed part of his success to the right choice of tyres. “To choose the right rear tyre was important. I tried the hard one in warm up but I didn’t get the right feeling. It was a risk to try the soft because both my rivals – Marquez and Rossi chose soft – but finally it came good. I was able to do really fast laps. It’s always important to start the season on the podium but it’s even better to get a victory. Tonight we party,” said Lorenzo after the race.
Ducati’s Dovizioso was happy to have emerged victorious in the battle against Marquez. “When you finish the race with Marc, it’s difficult to fight. We were on the edge. We really destroyed the rear tyre. In the last corner I knew Marc would try but my engine helped me to beat him. We finished last season with not so good a feeling but we worked really well and now the feeling has come back. We are really competitive with the new rules. I’m so happy to start like this,” said Dovizioso.
As for Marquez, the Spaniard was happy with his third-place finish on this difficult track for Honda. “The last corner was my only chance. I knew that if I overtook there he would get me before the line. But I’m really happy because I did my maximum. The perfect result would have been second place but it was difficult to overtake the Ducati after losing in acceleration on the straight. But we have 16 points for the championship and now we will go to tracks that are better for us,” said Marquez yesterday.
The Moto2 race had drama right at the start! Thomas Luthi, who started 10th on the grid claimed a sensational victory after seven of the top 10 riders on the grid jumped the start. Defending champion Johann Zarco, Sam Lowes, Marcel Schrotter and Alex Rins were all handed ride-through penalties for their false start. Pole position man Jonas Folger had a great start but fell on the third lap. Franco Morbidelli then had the lead and he battled it right till the end with Luthi. But Morbidelli also was given a 20-second penalty for his false start. That meant that despite finishing second, Morbidelli was classified as having finished seventh. Luis Salom rode well to take advantage of the front riders getting penalized and finished second. In third place was Simone Corsi who started the race in 14th place.
“I didn’t know (about the penalty to Morbidelli)! For me nothing changed, I won the race with and without his penalty. Maybe I didn’t need to take the risk at the end so that’s not that nice. But I stayed behind Franco, watched and attacked,” said Luthi after the race.
Salom was just excited to benefit from penalties. “It’s incredible. I can’t believe it! I was speaking with my mother yesterday and she said, “Enjoy! You’re not enjoying like 2011 and 2013!” I want to say thanks to my family. There were 2 difficult years and I’ll make my best from now until Valencia,” said Spanish rider yesterday.
Moto3 was the first race of the day and it’s the category that sees the most drama every season. And the start of the 2016 was no different with Niccolo Antonelli snatching victory from Brad Binder by seven thousands of a second! Third place went to Mahindra rider Francesco Bagnaia.
Throughout the race, the battle for the top spot was between Romano Fennati, Binder and Nicolo Bulega. Fennati started from pole and was either in the lead or thereabouts for most of the race. But in the penultimate lap, the Sky Racing Team VR46 rider ran wide from second and dropped out of the title fight. Fennati’s teammate, Bulega too led at multiple points in the race, but lost out in the frenetic last lap.
Binder would be the one who would feel the most pain. The South African started from sixth place from the grid after having gotten a penalty of three places for irresponsible riding during practice. He did well to get himself involved in the battle for victory and would have won the race if it weren’t for that last minute burst from Antonelli.
“In the last lap the slipstream can sometimes win, sometimes no. I knew if I stayed behind Brad I would be close. I’m very happy because it wasn’t an easy weekend,” said Antonelli after the race.

Results
MotoGP (top 10)
1. Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha)  42:28.452
2. Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati)  +2.019
3. Marc Marquez (Honda)  +2.287
4. Valentino Rossi (Yamaha)   +2.387
5. Dani Pedrosa (Honda)   +14.083
6. Maverick Vinales (Suzuki)   +15.423
7. Pol Espargaro (Yamaha Tech3)   +18.629
8. Bradley Smith (Yamaha Tech3)   +18.652
9. Hector Barbera (Ducati Avintia)  +21.160
10. Scott Redding (Ducati Pramac)  +24.435

Moto2 (top three)
1. Thomas Luthi (Kalex)  40:14.293
2. Luis Salom (Kalex)  +9.610
3. Simone Corsi (Speed Up)  +9.665
4. Hafizh Syarin (Kalex)  +13.558
5. Dominique Aegerter (Kalex)  +16.064

Moto3 (top three)
1. Niccolo Antonelli (Honda)  +38:12.161
2. Brad Binder (KTM)  +0.007
3. Francesco Bagnaia (Mahindra)  +0.148
4. Romano Fenati (KTM)  +0.435
5. Enea Bastianini (Honda)  +0.606