Aragon Moto2: Injured Fernandez dominates, Lowes crashes out

MotoGP-bound Fernandez broke a bone in his hand last Friday in a training incident and underwent surgery to correct it, but showed no signs of it holding him back at Aragon as he qualified third and eased to victory.

Poleman Lowes got his Marc VDS Kalex into the lead at the start of the 21-lap contest, with Ajo teammates Remy Gardner and Fernandez following suit in grid order.

Fernandez quickly dispatched of Gardner into the Turn 12 left-hander, which allowed Lowes to open up a lead of over six tenths of a second.

Over the next few laps Fernandez was able to eat into Lowes’ advantage at the head of the pack, while Gardner didn’t have the pace to keep his hooks in his teammate.

By lap five Gardner had dropped 1.6 seconds off the lead duo, while Fernandez had moved ahead of Lowes a tour earlier to take a lead he wouldn’t relinquish.

Fernandez’s gap quickly opened to a second by lap seven and would steadily grow by a few more tenths before Lowes’ race came to an end on the 13th tour when he crashed at Turn 7.

Now over six seconds clear of Gardner behind, Fernandez would continue to extend his lead to over eight seconds as he cruised to the chequered flag.

Gardner came under some pressure in the final two laps from the chasing Augusto Fernandez on the Marc VDS Kalex and Speed Up’s Jorge Navarro.

But the Australian was able to hold onto second through to the chequered flag to minimise his championship standings loss to just five points – his lead still a healthy 39 points going to Misano.

Augusto Fernandez was able to wipe a few more tenths out of Gardner’s advantage ahead of him, but the Marc VDS rider could do nothing to breach third ahead of Navarro.

A 1-2 for Raul Fernandez and Gardner has secured the teams’ title for Ajo Motorsport.

Aspar’s Aron Canet had a lonely ride to fifth ahead of Gresini Kalex of Fabio Di Giannantonio finished, while an impressive Fermin Aldeguer was seventh on the other Speed Up bike on the 16-year-old’s fourth Moto2 start.

Aldeguer beat Honda Team Asia’s Ai Ogura in the latter stages, with Intact GP duo Tony Arbolino and Marcel Schrotter rounding out the top 10 – though a post-race time penalty would demote the latter to 11th behind MV Agusta’s Simone Corsi.

A crash for VR46 rider Marco Bezzecchi on lap 10 has all but demolished his 2021 title hopes, the Italian now 72 points adrift of championship leader Gardner.

John McPhee was 20th and 47.756s off the victory on his Moto2 debut on the Petronas Sprinta bike, taking Jake Dixon’s place as his fellow Brit contests this weekend’s MotoGP race for Petronas SRT.

Aragon Moto2 - Race results:

Cla	#	Rider	Bike	Gap
1	25	Raúl Fernández	Kalex
2	87	Remy Gardner	Kalex	5.408
3	37	Augusto Fernandez	Kalex	6.824
4	9	Jorge Navarro	Boscoscuro B-21	7.051
5	44	Arón Canet	Boscoscuro B-21	10.695
6	21	Fabio Di Giannantonio	Kalex	15.160
7	54	Fermín Aldeguer	Boscoscuro B-21	16.730
8	79	Ai Ogura	Kalex	17.085
9	14	Tony Arbolino	Kalex	17.704
10	24	Simone Corsi	MV Agusta	20.121
11	23	Marcel Schrotter	Kalex	20.852
12	42	Marcos Ramirez	Kalex	24.602
13	16	Joe Roberts	Kalex	26.086
14	6	Cameron Beaubier	Kalex	29.101
15	13	Celestino Vietti Ramus	Kalex	30.301
16	70	Barry Baltus	NTS	30.420
17	81	Manuel Gonzalez	MV Agusta	34.977
18	62	Stefano Manzi	Kalex	35.789
19	55	Hafizh Syahrin	NTS	36.036
20	17	John McPhee	Kalex	47.756
21	18	Xavi Cardelus	Kalex	47.834
	35	Somkiat Chantra	Kalex
	11	Nicolo Bulega	Kalex
	22	Sam Lowes	Kalex
	64	Bo Bendsneyder	Kalex
	72	Marco Bezzecchi	Kalex
	19	Lorenzo Dalla Porta	Kalex
	75	Albert Arenas	Boscoscuro B-21
	40	Hector Garzo	Kalex
	97	Xavi Vierge	Kalex
	12	Thomas Luthi	Kalex
	74	Piotr Biesiekirski	Kalex
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