The Spaniard surprised the Turkish Deniz Öncü (KTM) by 51 thousandths of a second on the same finish line, with the Japanese Ayumu Sasaki (Husqvarna) in third position
The Spanish Daniel Holgado (KTM) added his third victory of the season by beating the Italian Grand Prix of Moto3 which was disputed in mugello circuit and that makes him more leader in the provisional championship.
Holgado surprised by 51 thousandths of a second on the same finish line the Turkish Deniz Öncü (KTM), with the Japanese Ayumu Sasaki (Husqvarna) in third position.
Daniel Holgado has 109 points, 35 points more than his immediate rival, Jaume Masiá (Honda), who finished fifth, with Iván Ortolá (KTM), who was eleventh, in third position with 68 points.
No less than eight drivers were sanctioned during practice with starting from the last positions of the starting formation and, in addition, comply with a “long lap” when notified by the direction of the Race.
The list of those sanctioned was made up of the Spaniards Iván Ortolá, Vicente Pérez, David Salvador and Xavier Artigas, the Italians Luca Lunetta and Stefano Nepa, the Brazilian Diogo Moreira and the Australian Joel Kelso. All of them, it seems, agreed to form a group from behind to come back as quickly as possible, in addition to doing the “long lap” at the same time in a clear team strategy.
But before the traffic light went out, the first surprise when the Italian Romano Fenati’s motorcycle stopped, he had to leave the formation to start the race from the workshop street if he managed to start the motorcycle.
When the light went out, the fastest at the start was the world championship leader, the Spanish Daniel Holgado (KTM), ahead of the Turkish Deniz Öncü (KTM) and the Japanese Ayumu Sasaki (Husqvarna), as one of those sanctioned, Diogo Moreira, came fourteenth in the first set, twelfth in the second and tenth in the third and last, starring in an epic comeback.
Right at the end of the first lap, the Carrera management sent the message to all the sanctioned pilots that they could comply with the second sanction, the “long lap”, in the next three laps, but Xavier Artigas would be one of those who could not fulfill it when he crashed on the second lap along with the Italian Filippo Farioli.
Öncü quickly recovered the first position, but in his wake, without taking off and with constant alternations in the lead, there were also Ayumu Sasaki, Jaume Masiá, Daniel Holgado, Taiyo Furusato, David Alonso, Tatsuki Suzuki, Riccardo Rossi and Diogo Moreira, who in the third lap complied with the “long lap” and barely lost two positions, from tenth to twelfth position. The leading group was made up of eight riders on that third lap, with the pursuer just over two seconds away and in which, among others, was Diogo Moreira.
Already in the fourth lap the clear leader of the training sessions, Deniz Öncü, stepped forward and changed the pace to try to escape, but Ayumu Sasaki was aware of the situation and with a record fastest lap he hooked up again with the Turkish pilot.
Of the eight leading pilots, three were left off the hookas a bridgehead with respect to their pursuers and that trio was made up of Rossi, Suzuki and Furusato, with Moreira pulling from behind to catch up with them in the chasing group.
In front, Ayumu Sasaki decided to take action on the sixth lap and overtook Deniz Öncü, but without being able to get away from him or Daniel Holgado, Jaume Masiá and David Alonso, a driver who was born in Spain but who competes in the world championship with a license from Colombia by having dual nationality. A lap later Öncü was back in the lead but he was overtaken on the long finish line, again, by Sasaki.
After the San Donato curve, Deniz Öncü regained first place and pushed hard, but once again Ayumu Sasaki put him in trouble and recovered his position, while one of those penalized, Joel Kelso, crashed in turn fifteen of that eighth turn.
Despite the “brawls” between Sasaki and Öncü, neither of them was able to break the leading quintet, which already had more than five seconds ahead of their pursuers on the ninth lap, in which Vicente Pérez (KTM), another of the penalized, ended up on the ground.
Jaume Masiá was the next leader of the race, on the twelfth lapalso chased by Ayumu Sasaki, just in case he tried to give a pull that would allow him to achieve a reassuring distance thinking about the last lap and knowing that in the finish line the KTM, Husqvarna and GasGas -all equipped with the same mechanics- they could “strike” because of their higher top speed.
Öncü tried it again on the thirteenth lap, in which he achieved an advantage of just over three tenths of a second, but at the end of the straight he was “hunted” again and, furthermore, he made a mistake when braking late that made both Daniel Baggy like Ayumu Sasaki outranked him. Nothing was decided, the quintet did not give an inch and everything heralded a last round of heart attack, as it was.
The overtaking on the last lap was really to the limit, with fairing touches between almost all of them and looking for the slightest loophole to overtake the rival, but with Deniz Öncü shooting like a “possessed” to try a reassuring advantage.
Öncü entered the finish line with a certain advantage and seemed to be heading towards his first World Cup victory, but Daniel Holgado had measured the distances very well and at the last moment he left his slipstream to beat him by just 51 thousandths of a second, with Ayumu Sasaki five thousandths behind the Turkish pilot, third.
David Alonso was in fourth place, ahead of Jaume Masiá, with Diogo Moreira seventh, Iván Ortolá in eleventh place, José Antonio Rueda (KTM), fourteenth, David Salvador (KTM), eighteenth, and Ana Carrasco (KTM), twentieth second and last.