Thomas Luthi took victory at Phillip Island by the smallest of margins, passing Franco Morbidelli on the final straight to win by only 0.010secs, firmly placing him as a title contender.
Luthi and Mattia Pasini held station in the top two places off the line but Sam Lowes had a disastrous start from P3 and dropped down to 9th. Lowes quickly got back up to 7th but then fell on Lap 2 at the second corner. Morbidelli had the best start in the field by moving from 9th up to 3rd.
The championship battle was an interesting one to see at the start with roles reversed from qualifying. Rins got up to 10th early on from 16th and Zarco down to 16th from 10th. Things were looking good for Rins as he continued to chip away through the field but he would lose the bike on lap five when he missed a gear change at Turn 2. He was out of the race and his championship aspirations have taken a huge knock, his disadvantage to Zarco 24 points.
Morbidelli continued his charge by getting past Pasini and then Luthi. Luthi had made a small error and would be passed by Pasini too. Keen not to lose touch, Luthi quickly bounced back and regained the lead by the next lap.
The race then settled down a little bit with riders mostly holding station, Pasini and Morbidelli, however, changed places many times behind Luthi. Eventually it became clear the top three were losing time to Lorenzo Baldassarri and Sandro Cortese behind, and an epic 5 way battle looked likely.
Cortese managed to pass Baldassarri and then Pasini with three laps to go. In his attempt to take back the podium spot Pasini would drop the bike at Turn 4, dropping him out of the points and giving a cruel end to a promising race.
The battle for the win really got exciting in the last laps. Morbidelli passed Luthi on the penultimate lap and Luthi could not pass Morbidelli on the home straight. However, Luthi closed the gap and got a great exit onto the home stright on the final lap. With the slipstream he was just able to pass Morbidelli to the line and won by only a hundredth of a second.
Cortese rounded off the podium ahead of Baldassarri, Takaaki Nakagami, Jonas Folger, Simone Corsi, Axel Pons, Marcel Schrotter and Xavi Vierge. Johann Zarco finished a lowly 12th but his championship lead increases to 21 points. It is now Luthi who is second in the championship and on current form, he has a decent shot at the title.
