Strong Qatar race from Guevara ends in getting caught up in another rider’s crash

The first race of the 2017 Moto3 World Championship was held yesterday, at the circuit of Losail.

After the cancellation of the QP because of bad weather on Saturday, on race afternoon the riders got out on track for a 30-minute warm up. A brief rain shower before the session left some wet spots along the track. Guevara and his crew decided to wait till the last ten minutes at disposal, when the conditions of the tarmac were improving.

In the race, Juanfran started from the ninth position on the grid and, in few turns, he joined the first group. Guevara confirmed a very competitive pace, fighting for the lead and also reaching the first placement. On the thirteenth lap, the rider from Lorca got involved in the crash of another rider and he was forced to retire, putting an unfortunate ending to the first GP of the season.

#58 Juanfran Guevara: not classified
“Today in the warm up we couldn’t try out some modifications to the setting, the track conditions weren’t favourable to check some improvements that we were considering. In the race, the performance of the bike was great: we had a strong pace, which was giving us the chance to fight for the victory. We had a good start and we also took the leading position of the race during a couple of laps: I felt smooth on top of my KTM machine. Unfortunately the ending of this weekend wasn’t the one we were hoping for. However, we proved that we can be in the front group: we still have 17 races to keep fighting for important results. We did a great job in this preseason and now we look forwards to Argentina, with high hopes and the desire to do well.”