Saturday's crash frustrations were all-but-forgotten as John McPhee’s fortunes shone for the Misano Moto3 contest, his dreams coming true with a magnificent victory after a nerve-wracking “crazy race” from 17th on the grid.

The Petronas rider’s rollercoaster weekend certainly ended on top after a strong Friday had given way to a difficult and challenging qualifying, leaving the Scot with everything to do come Sunday.

“I’m over the moon! It’s a dream come true to be on the top step here after the last race and all the problems there. I’m a bit lost for words, I’m so, so happy.

“I tried to set all my times on my own on Friday and then I completely let the team down in qualifying by having a crash right at the start. That race just couldn’t have gone any better for me though: it went perfectly to plan and I felt so strong.”

A good start saw McPhee immediately on the back of the top-10 by the first lap before manoeuvring himself into podium contention in the closing stages of the race.

After a brief stint in the lead with three laps to go, he calmly analysed the battling bikes around him from the middle of the front group, knowing he had the pace to take the win, his first since Le Mans last year, before capitalising on the final lap. His sights reset on the championship, McPhee has now reduced his deficit in the standings to 14 points.

I knew it would be hard to make my way through, but on the first lap I was already up to P11 so I just tried to keep calm and creep my way forward.

"I found myself back in 14th so I just tried to mount a charge to see what happened. On that last lap I felt really strong, so I knew I could pass one or two guys in the last few corners if I needed.

"It’s so easy to get slipstreamed down the back straight so honestly, the plan wasn’t to lead down there, but I just though ‘oh okay, I’ll certainly take it’ and managed to pull those last few corners off perfectly.

“I just want to say a massive thank you to the team; I couldn’t have done it without them. It’s still early days in the championship, let’s keep calm.

"I know I can be strong in every single race, we’ve shown that we can fight for the win every weekend, we’ve just not managed to pull it off until now but the momentum’s high.

"It’s good to close the gap but let’s see what happens next weekend and where we go from here.”