Over 76,000 fans were at the spectacular Mugello circuit today to see Jorge Lorenzo break the current Repsol Honda hegemony and take a forceful and masterful victory in the Italian GP and take his third consecutive victory at the Italian track and his second victory of the season, with Dani Pedrosa and Cal Crutchlow completing the podium.
Pedrosa was the polesitter but at the the first turn at the San Donato ran slightly wide with Jorge Lorenzo taking the lead, but the first dramatic suprise of the race was when at turn 3 of the first lap at the Luco and Poggio Secco, Alvaro Bautista lost the front of his Honda and crashing involved a hapless Valentino Rossi who ended up slamming heavily into the air fence, with the incident being investigated.
At the front Lorenzo, Pedrosa and Marc Marquez broke away leaving a huge gap behind them.
Halfway through the race Lorenzo changed speed and began distancing the Honda riders and on lap 13 he hammered out a stunning 1.
47.
929 that was the game changer, as the Yamaha rider speed away no longer contested, and would win with a highly comfortable 5.
4 second margin.
With Pedrosa and Marquez left alone, the rookie began pressuring his veteran team mate who was suffering with technical issues and with just five laps to go Marquez passed his team mate with one of the easiest passes that we’ve seen the rookie do and then peel away only and seem heading for a second place podium only to crash out with three laps to go as he lost the rear and throw away a perfect podium record.
With Marquez out of action Pedrosa inherited the second spot and Cal Crutchlow who was riding in a lonely fourth, until the Repsol Honda’s riders crash, which let him take second podium of the season needed and if the race was just a few laps longer he might have caught Pedrosa as he was fastly closing in.
Stefan Bradl finished fourth spending the entire race with Andrea Dovizioso and Nicky Hayden on his tail, but of the two Ducatisti only Dovizioso worried the LCR Honda rider on the final lap when they exchanged spots, but the German rider prevailed.
Dovizioso and Hayden swapped places twice, but Dovizioso was slightly faster as Hayden began to fade and the two factory riders finished fifth and sixth.
In a very distant seventh Ducati’s test rider Michele Pirro finished ahead of CRT rider Aleix Espargaro while injured Bradley Smith finished 9th and Hector Barbera closed out the top ten.
2013 MotoGP Mugello Race Results:01- Jorge Lorenzo – Yamaha Factory Racing – Yamaha YZR M1 – 23 laps in 41’39.
733 02- Dani Pedrosa – Repsol Honda Team – Honda RC213V – + 5.
400 03- Cal Crutchlow – Monster Yamaha Tech 3 – Yamaha YZR M1 – + 6.
412 04- Stefan Bradl – LCR Honda MotoGP – Honda RC213V – + 19.
321 05- Andrea Dovizioso – Ducati Team – Ducati Desmosedici GP13 – + 19.
540 06- Nicky Hayden – Ducati Team – Ducati Desmosedici GP13 – + 26.
321 07- Michele Pirro – Ducati Test Team – Ducati Desmosedici GP13 – + 38.
144 08- Aleix Espargaro – Power Electronics Aspar – ART GP13 – + 39.
802 09- Bradley Smith – Monster Yamaha Tech 3 – Yamaha YZR M1 – + 40.
243 10- Hector Barbera – Avintia Blusens – BQR FTR – + 48.
392 11- Randy De Puniet – Power Electronics Aspar – ART GP13 – + 48.
480 12- Danilo Petrucci – CAME Iodaracing Project – Ioda Suter BMW – + 1’13.
708 13- Andrea Iannone – Energy T.
I.
Pramac Racing – Ducati Desmosedici GP13 – + 1’14.
601 14- Colin Edwards – NGM Mobile Forward Racing – FTR Kawasaki – + 1’21.
249 15- Karel Abraham – Cardion AB Motoracing – ART GP13 – + 1’25.
738 16- Yonny Hernandez – Paul Bird Motorsport – ART GP13 – + 1’27.
339 17- Michael Laverty – Paul Bird Motorsport – PBM 01 – + 1’27.
758 18- Bryan Staring – GO&FUN Honda Gresini – FTR Honda MGP13 – + 1’44.
424 19- Lukas Pesek – CAME Iodaracing Project – Ioda Suter BMW – + 1’45.
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