Romano Fenati became the most successful rider in Moto3 history after romping to his 10th career win at a rain–lashed Motegi, as Joan Mir finished outside of the points.
The race was run over a shortened 13–lap distance after a lengthy delay in morning warm-up, caused by an oil spill from Andrea Migno’s Sky VR46 KTM.
It was Fenati‘s countryman and pole man Nicolo Bulega who took the holeshot as the race got underway, though soon found himself dropping out of the top 10 as Niccolo Antonelli hit the front.
Behind, championship leader Mir – who could have wrapped up the Moto3 title today – struggled to make any impression on the top 20 from 20th on the grid in the treacherous conditions.
At the end of the second lap, Antonelli and Fenati had started to pull away from the rest of the field, with the Rivacold Snipers rider taking the lead at Turn 7 on lap three.
Antonelli tried his best to cling onto Fenati‘s coat tails but, as he did last month in similar conditions at Misano, Fenati eased into the distance while the Red Bull KTM rider steadily dropped into the clutched of the chasing Marco Bezzecchi and Tatsuki Suzuki.
As the rain intensified over the final few laps, Fenati‘s lead only increased and he cruised across the line to secure his third win of the season by a margin of almost five seconds.
Antonelli‘s pace really dropped towards the end of the race, but he held onto second to secure his first podium since winning the Qatar Grand Prix at the start of 2016, while CIP Mahindra’s Bezzecchi kept his resolve intact for his maiden podium finish.
Mir failed to make any progress on the top 15 as the race concluded, marking his first non-score of the season and giving up an 80-point lead in the standings to Fenati, who now sits 55 points adrift with three races to go.
Home favourite Tatsuki Suzuki’s podium challenge faded on the final lap, but the SIC58 rider still took the team’s best finish with fourth ahead of Aron Canet, while Philipp Oettl worked his way from outside of the top 20 in the opening laps to complete the top six.
Fabio Di Gianntonio headed Jakub Kornfeil, Bo Bendsneyder and John McPhee to round out the top 10, with Nakarin Atiratphuvapat, Bulega, team-mate Migno, Marcos Ramirez and Jorge Martin taking the last of the points.
Both RBA riders Juanfran Guevara and Gabriel Rodrigo, as well as the SIC Honda duo of Ayumu Sasaki – who collided with Rodrigo’s errant bike at Turn 11 – and Adam Norrodin crashed out, as did Manuel Pagliani on the sister CIP bike and Aspar’s Lorenzo Dalla Porta.
Dalla Porta’s team-mate, Albert Arenas, was forced to sit out the 13-lap encounter after injuring himself in a crash in qualifying.
