MotoGP Catalunya July 2008 – 250CC

Alvaro Bautista threw away what should have been his second win of the year just four comers from the finish line allowing Mugello winner Marco Simon celli through for his second consecutive race win.

The pair shared the lead throughout the 23 laps with Bautista enjoying the advantage pretty much all the way as the pace got faster and faster. As he braked for the final stadium section he was just far enough ahead of Simoncelli to be safe from an out braking attack, but instead he out braked himself, ran wide and the Italian was through into the lead. Bautista tried desperately to make amends for his mistake through the last three corners, crossing the line four hundredths of a second down. Hector Barbera who had run with the two leaders until halfway, finished a lonely third, rrsec down on the leaders.

Mika Kallio’s world championship lead shrunk from 18 points to three when the Finn’s bike broke just three laps from the flag while he was behind fourth place finisher, Alex Debon. Kallio now leads Simoncelli by the slightest of margins with Mattia Pasini a further five points down. Pasini finished this race in sixth place, just behind Thomas Luthi. Bautista, who had already crashed out of the lead twice so far this year, admitted his error.

MotoGP Italy July 2008 – 250CC

Wild haired Italian, Marco Simoncelli won a dramatic last lap 250 victory after colliding with race rival Hector Barbera as the leading pair crossed the start-finish line to commence the final lap.

The collision occurred when leader Simoncelli swerved to the left to break Barbera from his draft, but Barbera’s bike was by far the fastest of the two and the Spaniard was already accelerating past the Italian’s left when the leader

made his move. Barbera might have survived the impact, but his front brake snagged on the rear of Simon celli’s bike, sending him cartwheeling down the track at around 15mph. Barbera was lucky to escape with a battering and a bruising.

Simon celli might never have won if early leader Alvaro Bautista hadn’t crashed out of the lead on lap seven. This was Bautista’s second rumble out of the lead in three races.

Second place went to on form Alex Debon who came out best of a long duel with Thomas Luthi.

Mika Kallio maintained his championship lead despite losing his clutch which consigned him to finishing fourth. In fact the Finn was lucky, he had been way down in 13th during the early stages and owed many of his extra points to rivals falling my the wayside.

MotoGP Italy July 2008 – 125CC

Simone Corsi won a humdinger of a 125CC race at Mugello, the top seven men crossing the line covered by just eight tenths of a second after twenty laps of breathtaking action.

The leading group jostled for position changing places innumerable times. The scariest action took place on the run into turn one with handlebars tangling, fairings kissing as the leaders sought drafts off their rivals and then went to out brake them.

Sometimes it seemed inevitable there would be some kind of high speed pile up, but the riders proved able to keep everything together with just millimetres to spare. At half-distance the action had been even busier as the top 12 riders were separated by just I.2Sec.

Corsi timed his attack to perfection, grabbing the lead from Bradley Smith as they swept into turn one for the last time. Smith had come back from nth on lap three to go first with two laps to go. But leading down Mugello’s long start-finish straight for the penultimate time isn’t always the cleverest thing to do and the young Briton got swamped by Corsi, Gabor Talmacsi, Pol Esargaro and Mike di Meglio in the space of a 100 yards. Corsi had his Aprilia sliding and jumping out the final turn, crossing the line 19 hundredths ahead of reigning champ Talmacsi