Moto3: Suzuki Converts Pole to First 2020 Win, Arenas Crashes Out

Round three of the 2020 Moto3 World Championship took place in Jerez, for the first ever Andalusian Grand Prix. As the Spanish Grand Prix that preceded it by one week at the same venue, the Andalusian round was characterised by hot, gruelling temperatures.

The race was dominated, start-to-finish, by Tatsuki Suzuki. The Japanese rider needed to respond after his pole-to-eighth race one week ago, and he certainly did that, making the holeshot and leading almost every lap, including the most important one: the final lap. It was Suzuki’s second Moto3 victory, his first of the season and the first victory from pole position in the lightweight class in Jerez since Marco Simoncelli in 2004. Once again, the SIC58 Squadra Corse’s script is impossible to write. 

Second place went to John McPhee, who showed more caution in the final corner compared to last week, probably with the championship in mind considering Albert Arenas, the points leader coming into this race, had crashed out earlier on and would score no points. 

That crash for Arenas was big for the championship, and even more frustratingly for Arenas it came after his closest championship rival, Ai Ogura, had been taken out by Jaume Masia. The non-score for Arenas also meant that the likes of Suzuki and McPhee are much closer in the championship, which takes on a much different look ahead of round four at Brno in a few weeks. 

Celestino Vietti’s race was opposite this week compared to last week, when he was fast in the first half and suffered more in the second half. This time, Vietti dropped back in the beginning, to the fringes of the points, but once he found clear air was able to claw his way back to the front group. Taking advantage of crashes for the likes of Arenas, Ogura and Masia, as well as making some strong passes himself on the two Gresini riders, Jeremy Alcoba and Gabriel Rodrigo, he was able to come through to the podium, his first of the season. 

A penalty for Jeremy Alcoba as a result of not serving a long-lap penalty for exceeding track limits penalty promoted Darryn Binder to fourth, his best finish of the year having fought up from 25th on the grid. Most of Binder’s progress was made in the first two or three laps, and from then on he fought for the podium, just falling back on the final lap when he seemed to struggle with the front stability. 

Behind Binder was Gabriel Rodrigo, in fifth, after another fight for the podium that the Argentine could not win. He also benefited from Alcoba’s penalty, and finished 1.9 seconds ahead of Raul Fernandez who fought inside the front group for most of the race but fell back towards the end and finished sixth.

After his penalty was applied, Jeremy Alcoba finished seventh, ahead of the Estrella Galicia 0,0 pairing of Sergio Garcia and Ryusei Yamanaka, who finished eighth and ninth, respectively. For Yamanaka, ninth represented his best result in the World Championship. 

Tony Arbolino disappointed in tenth, having chosen the hard-compound rear tyre one week on from finishing third in the Spanish Grand Prix one week ago. This time, the Italian’s pace slipped at around half-distance, and there was no rebound from the #14.

Kaito Toba missed out on a top ten by just over 0.3 seconds, finishing 11th in the end. There was also a 0.3-second gap behind Toba, back to Romano Fenati, who was just ahead of Carlos Tatay, Stefano Nepa and Niccolo Antonelli who took the final point. 

Yuki Kunii took his best finish in Grand Prix racing, although missed out on points in 16th. Behind the Japanese was a trio of riders who all also scored their best finishes: Barry Baltus in 17th, Maximilian Kofler in 18th and Jason Dupasquier in 19th. Khairul Idham Pawi rounded out the top 20. 

Riccardo Rossi finished 21st ahead of Andrea Migno who was 22nd and last of the classified finishers after a crash earlier on in the race which ended Ayumu Sasaki’s day. 

There were eight retirements, the first of which was Filip Salac, before Ai Ogura pulled in after his collision with Jaume Masia. Ogura pulled in on the same lap Albert Arenas crashed, and one lap later Masia was out. Ayumu Sasaki then pulled in after his crash with Andrea Migno, before Deniz Oncu’s top six challenge on his birthday was ended with a crash. Dennis Foggia’s miserable weekend ended three laps from the end, before Davide Pizzoli’s race ended on the penultimate lap.