Moto3: Fenati tops all-Italian podium after Silverstone domination

Round 12 of the 2021 Moto3 World Championship, the British Grand Prix, took place in Silverstone. Conditions were dry, but the standard late-summer British weather was present, so temperatures were low, the wind was relatively high and the threat of rain was never entirely absent. Romano Fenati started from pole position, and having dominated the weekend overall was the favourite to take the victory in the race.

Gabriel rodrigo must have thought he had made the holeshot into turn one, but Romano Fenati held first place around the outside. Immediately, the Italian set about imposing his pace. 

It was Fenati who led the opening lap, ahead of Niccolo Antonelli, Andrea Migno and Riccardo Rossi, who were spread out themselves and pulling away from fifth-placed Dennis Foggia. 

Fenati was not able to break away from his two compatriots behind, but by lap two Rossi was already struggling to keep the pace of the leaders and began falling back to Foggia and the battle for fifth. 

That battle soon became the battle for the final podium spot, as Rossi was overwhelmed by the group, whose pace he could not match as the race wore on, and Andrea Migno suffered a mechanical retirement on lap six. 

With just the two of them at the front, Fenati and Antonelli continued to pull away from Foggia behind, who was generally engaged in battle with Darryn Binder, Jaume Masia and Izan Guevara at various points. 

The gap between the front two and the fight for third extended out to over three seconds before Foggia’s hard-option rear tyre (Foggia was the only rider of the top 10 to make this choice) became of benefit. At that point, Foggia was able to escape the group along with the aforementioned Guevara, with whom Foggia fought for third. 

In the final two laps, Fenati managed to finally break away from Antonelli, while behind Antonelli was coming under pressure from Foggia and Guevara. 

As Fenati cruised to a first victory of the season on the final lap, Antonelli dug in and remained clear of Foggia and Guevara to seal his second podium of 2021. In the battle for third, Guevara made his move on Foggia at Stowe, but the Italian retaliated at Abbey. Guevara tried once more at Brooklands, but Foggia was simply superior on the brakes compared to his Spanish rival, and was able to take his second straight podium.

For Fenati, victory meant he closed his deficit in the championship to 69 points, and it was arguably one of his greatest performances in Grand Prix racing, topping every session and leading every lap. An embrace with Antonelli between turns one and two on the cooldown lap was deserved for the pair of them, as were the ones shared between all three Italians in parc ferme. 

In fourth place, Izan Guevara would have been forgiven for being disappointed. However, in the garage afterwards he seemed content with his work. In the Moto3 Junior World Championship last season, Guevara won all three races in Aragon from 28th on the grid, and with Aragon next up on the calendar, the Spanish rookie seems to have hit his best form of the season at the right moment.

Tatsuki Suzuki finished fifth, in his best performance since Assen. The Japanese was ahead of Jaume Masia, Darryn Binder, Deniz Oncu and Riccardo Rossi, who held onto a top 10 in ninth. 

Carlos Tatay was able to break away in the closing stages from a large group that ended up battling for 11th. 10th is Tatay’s best result since Jerez when he was sixth at the flag. 

That battle for 11th was mostly conditioned by a battle within it, taking place between Pedro Acosta and Sergio Garcia. The top two in the championship seemed focused solely on one another, while the others seemed to simply be caught up in their fight. In the end it was Acosta who came out on top, crossing the line 12th and taking 11th after a penalty for John McPhee. 

McPhee crossed the line ahead of Acosta but had exceeded track limits on the final lap, which dropped him to 12th. McPhee had made a good recovery after being squeezed out at Maggots on the first lap. He dropped to last, so did well to come back to the points. 

Ayumu Sasaki was 13th, ahead of Filip Salac and Gabriel Rodrigo, who went from second on the grid to 15th in the race on the day he was announced to be replacing the retiring Tom Luthi in the SAG team in Moto2.

Sergio Garcia crossed the line 17th, but a penalty for Stefano Nepa that was equal to that of McPhee promoted the Spaniard to 16th. No points, but he only lost four to Acosta, so not a complete disaster for the #11 Aspar GASGAS rider. 

After his penalty, Nepa was 17th, ahead of Xavi Artigas, Adrian Fernandez and Alberto Surra who completed the top 20. Jeremy Alcoba disappointed in 21st, ahead of Lorenzo Fellon, Ryusei Yamanaka, Yuki Kunii (who had a long lap penalty for his involvement in the crash between himself and Kaito Toba in qualifying yesterday), and Maximilian Kofler who was last of the 25 finishers.

There were only two retirements: the aforementioned Andrea Migno, and Kaito Toba who crashed at Abbey but walked away.