Bo Bendsneyder received a gridpenalty after the qualifying session, due to “irresponsible riding”; for being slow in 3 consecutive sectors. Despite protesting the penalty with
good arguments ( He could show the clarks of the course video footage of him having to go off throttle for a slower rider) the penalty was given anyway. So he had to start from 20th ( 12 place penalty; third time this season). After a reasonable start wich saw him go to 16th after the first lap, Bo lost some spots and was in 19th after lap 2. In front of the race there was a 5 rider group battling for the lead: Joan Mir, Fabio DiGiannantonio, Enea Bastianini, Andrea Migno and Brad Binder. Binder had a problem in lap two and plunged down the order to 22nd spot. Joan Mir was stretching out his lead to almost 0.75 of a second, when he was ordered to drop down a spot for overtaking under yellow. This handed the lead to Andrea Migno. Brad Binder was halfway the race in 10th after a strong recovery. Bo bendsneyder was in 17th. Binder was almost unstoppable and with 8 laps to go he was already in third. With 4 laps to go he took over the lead, but made a slight mistake wich saw him drop back to fourth again. In the penultimate lap Binder was in second again and in the last lap he took over the lead from Mir; Binder won his 7th GP this year, in front of Mir, Migno, Bastianini, DiGiannantonio, Guevarra, Kornfeil, Oettl, Navarro and Martin. Bo Bendsneyder had a strong last part of the race and managed to pass Bulega, Loi and Quartararo, to finish in 13th.
Bo Bendsneyder #64:
“I can not say that I am completely happy about today. The bike worked great; with new tyres it behaved a little nervously, but once they began to wear I gained more confidence and a better feeling and went faster. From the second half of the race to the end I had a great pace, but I lost a lot in the first seven or eight laps. The penalty was a shame, but it was my mistake and I need towork on it. In the end, we came back from 20th to 13th and we earned three points that allow us to finish in 14th position overall, so I am quite happy. I want to thank the whole team and above all Aki [Ajo] for believing in me; It was a good season for us. We have taken two podiums and quite a few Top 10 finishes. I’m already looking forward to Wednesday’s test.”
Race results:
source: motogp.com, badboybo64.com, ajo.fi
