Daniel Holgado extends championship lead with victory at Mugello, DNF for Filippo Farioli
Despite not being the favorite for the win with Turkish rider Deniz Oncu dominating the timesheets all weekend, Daniel Holgado managed to pull out of his bag his third victory of the season on Sunday in Mugello within the last meters of the Italian Grand Prix. The Spaniard won his second race in a row after his triumph at the French Grand Prix, to extend his Moto3™ championship lead to thirty-five points before heading to Sachsenring next week for the German Grand Prix.
Starting from the front row in third, championship leader Daniel Holgado was more than motivated to race in Mugello with the objective to retain the head of the table. When the lights went out at 11:00 (GMT+2) to declare the start of the battle, the Spaniard positionned himself behind a few riders to take advantage of their slipstreams, and together with a late breaking, he came out of the first corner in second, just behind poleman Deniz Oncu. Very quickly, a front group of five riders (D. Holgado, D. Oncu, J. Masia, A. Sazaki and D. Alonso) escaped from the others, and that was the start of the fight for the win.
The Spaniard led laps 2 and 3 before dropping to the back of the group, hoping to cool things down for a few minutes after a spicy start. Shortly after, he rode his fastest lap in 1’56.904 on lap 5 to make it back just behind the race leader. Overtake after oftertake, slipstream after slipstream, late breaking after late breaking, their similar race paces meant that the positions continued to change at almost every lap. With seven laps to go, the front group had a 6.337 seconds gap on the rider in P6, but their continous fights also meant that this gap considerably reduced within the final laps. Shortly after that, Dani managed to make a move on both Sazaki and Masia to position himself in second, before taking the lead in the first corner of the following lap, which is immediately gave back. The final sector of Mugello is always a crucial one, and with that in mind, Holgado made sure to exit the final corner in second to position himself behind Oncu to take advantage of his slipstream in the final straight. He overtook him on the finished line to grab his third win of the season.
Italian Filippo Farioli was looking forward to race on home turf in front of home crowd, and was starting from P17, with a special helmet design dedicated to the beautiful Mugello layout. When the lights went out, he took a good start, but the craziness of the lightweight class brought him down in the arrabiata of the first lap, after being hit by another rider. It was not a nice high side, so he headed directly to the medical centre for a check up. Nothing bad to declare, he came out of the race without any injury. A disappointing weekend for Farioli, but there is already another chance next week as Red Bull KTM Tech3 is now headed to Sachsenring for the German Grand Prix, on June 16-18, 2023.
Daniel Holgado
“Deniz Oncu has been dominating this weekend and was so fast and strong, so we knew that we were not the favorites to win. However, my pace has been really good too this weekend, I worked a lot alone, and I think that today, we did a really good performance, probably the best of my three wins. I rode smartly, was patient and only overtook when it was right. The bike was so fast in both straights and corners. I would like to thank my team for their amazing job, I feel really happy with them. Looking forward to heading to Sachsenring next week.”
Filippo Farioli
“We did not take a bad start to the race, during the first lap, I tried to overtake as much as I could after loosing some positions due to a small contact with another rider. Then later on, I crashed in the arrabiata. I thought that I had crashed on my own, but then after checking the data with my crew, we could see that I got hit from behind by another rider. I did a big highside, but I am feeling no pain, so this is what is the most important. Disappointing weekend, but we have another race week ahead in Germany, and we will focus on this.”
