Britain’s Sam Lowes took a solid fourth place in today’s Moto2 race at the Catalunya MotoGP round as Johann Zarco bagged the win and increased his championship lead by passing reigning champion Tito Rabat on the last lap.
The result means Lowes climbs to third place in the championship stakes, leapfrogging Thomas Luthi who could only muster sixth place in Spain.
Rabat had led for a majority of the race with Lowes, and Alex Rins in close attendance as Zarco came across a gap in the closing lap to first pass Lowes for third and then Rins for second.
Rabat looked to have the pace to sew up the win but Zarco just nipped under Rabat to claim the win. Rabat tried to make it back into the final two corners but ran wide and that allowed Rins to sneak past and claim second as Zarco performed his victory back-flip to the delight of the crowd.
Lowes ended the race 2.799s behind Zarco but was in the mix for most of the 23 laps and was only half a second slower than the podium men in the closing stages. Luis Salom claimed fifth place by just three-tenths from Luthi.
