Britain’s Sam Lowes bagged a solid seventh place in his Moto2 debut under the floodlights of Qatar’s MotoGP round while battling with a lack of grip and some chatter early on.
The Speed Up man eventually had a lonely race after Swiss Dominic Aegerter ended his run of 33 finishes with a breakdown out of eighth which promoted the Derby-based rider to seventh. Lowes had to follow Aegerter as his bike smoked its way around two thirds of a lap before he got the meatball flag and pulled over. Sixth-placed Simone Corsi was eight seconds in front and former Moto3 world champion Sandro Cortese 11 seconds behind.
Lowes shrugged off a crash in warm-up and a trip off the track on the warm-up lap to start well and get involved in an immediate battle for top-ten positions. He then settled down and kept out of trouble to net his first Grand Prix points of his career.
The race was won by MarcVDS’ Tito Rabat, who just outdragged Taka Nakagami to line by just 0.40s with the second MarcVDS machine of Mika Kallio in third place, a second or so in arrears. Thomas Luthi and rookie Maverick Vinales completed the top five.
Gino Rea retired from the race with an oil leak in the early stages.
