MotoGP hosted its second Virtual Race – dubbed as #StayAtHomeGP – from the Red Bull Ring circuit in Austria with Pramac Racing’s Francesco Bagnaia winning.
After much success of MotoGP with Virtual Race 1, where Honda’s Alex Marquez took the win, they returned with their second event on Sunday at the Red Bull Ring circuit in Austria, with a new line-up alongside some returning riders.
In the returning list were the Honda duo of Alex and Marc Marquez, Petronas SRT’s Fabio Quartararo, Pramac Racing’s Francesco Bagnaia and Yamaha’s Maverick Vinales. While the new list had MotoGP legend Valentino Rossi joining in, in the Yamaha.
He had Ducati pair of Danilo Petrucci and Michele Pirro, with Avintia Racing’s Tito Rabat in as well along with LCR Honda’s Takaaki Nakagami. The pole went to Bagnaia with Vinales second and A Marquez in Top 3 – separated by 0.066s, while Rossi was 10th and last.
The session had multiple crashes as we saw in the 10-lap race too. It was another mayhem at the start with Nakagami leading for a brief moment before Bagnaia re-took the lead ahead of Vinales and A Marquez as it was back as how they started.
The fight for third was on though with A Marquez having brother Marc behind him along with Nakagami. The Japanese though fell back as he had a supreme crash against Quartararo, with their bikes flying off. The lead battle got heated at the front.
Both Bagnaia and Vinales went back and forth all-through with the Italian prevailing to win the MotoGP Virtual Race 2 at Spielberg as Alex Marquez completed the podium from brother Marc as Quartararo rounded out the Top 5 positions.
The final corner saw another crash for Rossi as he dropped to seventh behind Petrucci, while Nakagami ended up eighth ahead of Pirro and Rabat to make it the 10 riders, who entered in the MotoGP Virtual Race 2 at Red Bull Ring.
Here’s the video recap of MotoGP Virtual Race 2:
Here’s Dorna on cancelling being last resort
Here’s details of Virtual Race 2
Here’s latest on MotoGP postponing races
Here’s behind the scenes from Virtual Race and numbers too
Here’s note on Dorna helping MotoGP, Moto2 and Moto3 teams