Reigning MotoGP World Champion Marc Marquez battled his way back from ninth on the first lap of today’s Le Mans race to take his fifth victory in a row, crossing the line ahead of early leader Valentino Rossi with Alvaro Bautista doing his job prospects the world of good in third.
Marquez got a poor start and was mired in the pack, and then he ran off track when Jorge Lorenzo made an error in front of him and the young Spaniard almost dropped out of the top ten entirely.
But he fought back, picking his way carefully through the field as both Lorenzo and Dani Pedrosa failed to match the pace of Rossi at the front, and the youngster passed the old master when Rossi ran wide with 16 laps to go and cleared off.
It was the second race in succession Rossi beat Lorenzo on a level playing field, finishing five seconds ahead of his team-mate, while Pedrosa looked absolutely shattered when he got off the RC213V and sat back down in his garage. His arm-pump surgery last week may have caused some problems today.
The experienced pair were both beaten by Pol Espargaro, who took his best result in fourth and was only half a second behind Bautista at the chequered flag. Pedrosa got the better of Lorenzo at half distance but it is a bad day in the office for both the factory riders.
Both Stefan Bradl and Andrea Doviziosi were mixing it at the sharp end early on. The Ducati man got the holeshot and led before he was passed by Rossi while Bradl faded later on, possibly as a result of his recent arm-pump surgery.
Aleix Espargaro managed to keep Bradley Smith behind him for ninth while Cal Crutchlow struggled to 11th place. Scott Redding ended in 12th with Michael Laverty only one second away from a point score in 16th.
