Manuel González wins over Celestino Vietti, with 0.2 seconds between them at the end. Izan Guevara joined them on the podium four seconds behind. Vietti looked strong all weekend but just couldn’t quite get the final piece of the puzzle together for the perfect ending.
Celestino Vietti tops Friday Practice.
A perfect start to the weekend for Celestino Vietti after topping both morning and afternoon practice. Even though Vietti was the fastest, Senna Agius and Alonso López, second and third, were separated by only 0.026 seconds.
The morning session was quite quiet with a cold Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. All the riders looked to be dialling in their settings and staying on two wheels. As a result, not much happened during the session.
Ángel Piqueras and Jorge Navarro are out for the weekend with an injury. Piqueras is still injured after his crash in America, and Navarro after his crash last weekend in Le Mans. They have been replaced by Xabi Zurutuza and Unai Orradre.
Even with a dull session, there was still some amazing footage.
The afternoon session started with an issue for David Alonso, who seemed to be plagued by mechanical problems throughout the session. Because of this, he will have to go through Q1 in qualifying.
The ELF Marc VDS Team had a stronger start to the weekend after a hard start to the year, with both bikes finishing in the top 12. Overall, it was Vietti who topped off the perfect day.
Celestino Vietti takes a tight pole position.
Vietti outperforms everyone while his boss, Valentino Rossi, was in attendance, taking pole by 0.262 seconds over Collin Veijer and González closely behind in third. As always, qualifying starts with the Q1 session.
As always, the battle for the top four spots was tight. With everyone pushing to get the best grid position possible. When pushing, mistakes were made, leading to Zonta van den Goorbergh crashing and ending his session, and to a miraculous save from José Antonio Rueda.
In the end, it was Luca Lunetta, Iván Ortolá, José Antonio Rueda and David Alonso who made it through to Q2. All four riders were separated by 0.125 seconds, showing how close the Moto2 field really is at the moment.
With the bottom end of the grid decided, the top 18 still needed to find their grid positions. Within the first five minutes, Daniel Holgado had a huge moment when pushing for a lap. This put a lot of pressure on the team to fix the bike so he could get back on track which he did.
There was also a big collision between Álex Escrig and Alberto Ferrández. The incident was Escrig’s fault, with the crash being a big one.
While all that was happening it the fastest lap time was changing frequently between Vietti and González. Veijer also put in some stunning laps, which eventually put him second on the grid, an amazing result for the rookie.
Qualifying top 10
P1: #13 Celestino Vietti 1:41.076
P2: #95 Collin Veijer +0.262
P3: #18 Manuel González +0.360
P4: #4 Iván Ortolá +0.379
P5: #21 Alonso López +0.445
P6: #44 Arón Canet +0.476
P7: #12 Filip Salač +0.507
P8: #96 Daniel Holgado +0.550
P9: #98 José Antonio Rueda +0.579
P10: #32 Luca Lunetta +0.605
Manuel González Wins On Sunday
González wins a closely contested race between himself and Vietti, with 0.2 seconds between them at the end. Izan Guevara joined them on the podium but was four seconds behind the front two. With this race track being very hard on tyre conservation, the field did spread out as the race went on.
Both Vietti and González made a good start, while Collin Veijer went backwards off the line and never managed to find any pace after that. The first few laps saw many close battles across the grid. Alonso López and Izan Guevara were having a battle for third, which allowed Vietti and González to start pulling away from the rest.
Senna Agius had an amazing start from 12th and worked his way up the field. His battle with David Alonso rumbled on for a few laps. Agius eventually came out on top and kept climbing up the field.
Vietti eventually started building a gap, which never exceeded 0.6 seconds. But on lap 12, that gap started to drop, and with four laps to go González was on his tail. Veijer’s terrible race got even worse after a crash. Thankfully, he was ok.
González eventually got into the lead and managed to keep it all the way to the end. Vietti didn’t give up without a fight, keeping the battle for the win going right up until the end.
González kept his cool and took the victory over Vietti, extending his championship lead as well.
Race top 10
P1: #18 Manuel González
P2: #13 Celestino Vietti
P3: #28 Izan Guevara
P4:#4 Iván Ortolá
P5: #96 Daniel Holgado
P6:#80 David Alonso
P7: #12 Filip Salač
P8: #21 Alonso López
P9: #32 Luca Lunetta
P10: #81 Senna Agius