Máximo Quiles took the win at the San Marino Grand Prix. The win came on the run to the line when Quiles got in front of David Almansa by 0.021 seconds. Brian Uriarte took the final place on the podium. The race had a fast pace, with few overtakes.
Almansa Fastest on Friday
Almansa topped Friday’s mixed conditions ahead of Joel Kelso and Quiles. With the morning session being completely wet, the riders had more of a challenge.
With the track wet and riders knowing Sunday would be a dry race, they were slow to get out. The riders went out to learn the track, but they could not gather that much data due to the conditions.
It was Kelso who ended the morning session fastest after a quiet session. With the mixed conditions, the leaderboard was very mixed, making it hard to predict the rest of the weekend.
As the afternoon session approached, the track dried up, making it more valuable to the riders. The session was quiet with riders trying to concentrate on finding the correct setting.
There was a high side in the session for B. Uriarte. After he crashed, he went back into the circuit, and luckily, everyone managed to avoid him. It was still a very scary incident, from which he luckily walked away.
The rest of the session, riders were pushing for lap times to try for a top-14 position and go straight into Q2. Almansa set the fastest lap of the day and topped the session.
Practice Top 10
P1: #22 David Almansa 1:40.767
P2: #66 Joel Kelso +0.402
P3: #28 Máximo Quiles +0.558
P4: #97 Marco Morelli +0.631
P5: #27 Rico Salmela +0.660
P6: #73 Valentín Perrone +0.685
P7: #18 Matteo Bertelle +0.746
P8: #8 Eddie O’Shea +0.821
P9: #78 Joel Esteban +0.840
P10: #51 Brian Uriarte +0.930
Almansa Takes Pole
Almansa dominated Saturday’s qualifying, taking pole by 0.2 seconds. B. Uriarte was the closest challenger to Almansa, coming in second, with Kelso taking third. With limited dry time some riders did not have as much data as usual.
Qualifying One
Going into Q1 allows four riders to advance into the next session and get a better grid spot. Qualifying at a track like Misano is very important, as it is tight, making overtaking hard.
As the pit lane opened, all the riders headed out on track to set their best lap time. Most riders went for a two-run strategy, setting a decent lap before heading back into the pits, changing their tyres, and coming back out to set a fast lap. As always there was some riders going slow and ruining other riders laps.
The riders who made it through to Q2 were Álvaro Carpe, Ryusei Yamanaka, Hakim Danish, and Jesús Ríos.
Qualifying Two
With Q2 underway, it was time for the top 18 riders to fight it out to get pole position. Many riders were straight out on track to see the track conditions and try to get the best lap they could.
Overall, the session was very quiet, with all the riders working hard to find a good lap time. Even with a moment at the end of the lap, Almansa was the fastest rider with a time of 1:40.612.
Qualifying Top 10:
P1: #22 David Almansa 1:40.612
P2: #51 Brian Uriarte +0.217
P3: #66 Joel Kelso +0.397
P4: #73 Valentín Perrone +0.499
P5: #28 Máximo Quiles +0.515
P6: #18 Matteo Bertelle +0.772
P7: #67 Casey O’Gorman +0.814
P8: #27 Rico Salmela +0.894
P9: #83 Álvaro Carpe +0.944
P10: #19 Scott Ogden +0.956
Quiles Wins San Marino Grand Prix on the Last Corner
Quiles took the win at the San Marino Grand Prix. With two wins in a row after the Aragon Grand Prix, Quiles’ championship is looking safer than ever. He took the win over Almansa by 0.021 seconds. Uriarte took the final place on the podium. The race had a fast pace, with few overtakes.
Before the race started, some penalties were handed out, affecting the grid positions. Adrián Cruces received a nine-place grid penalty due to excessively slow sectors. Álvaro Carpe received a 12-place grid penalty due to excessively slow sectors.
After a good clean start to the race Almansa kept his llead after the first lap. There was a couple of incidents in the first lap with Carpe crashing out of the race, not good for his championship run. There was also an incident at the back of the field for Leo Rammerstorfer and Nicola Carraro.
The top six of the race pulled away from the rest of the field, and the riders were setting a high pace, with Qulies going faster than he did in qualifying. Despite the fast pace, the riders kept it clean.
Quiles and B. Uriarte was slowly catching up to Almansa splitting the group of six into a group of three. With seven laps to go Qulies and B. Uriarte got track limits warnings adding more pressure to their race.
With a fastest lap of the race on lap 16 for Quiles, he was on the charge to catch Almansa. With two laps to go the battle for the win was in full force. Almansa managed to hold Quiles off for most of the last lap until the last corner where Quiles went for the overtake and pushed to take the win over the line.
Race Top 10:
P1: #28 Máximo Quiles
P2: #22 David Almansa +0.021
P3: #51 Brian Uriarte +1.343
P4: #18 Matteo Bertelle +12.219
P5: #73 Valentín Perrone +12.258
P6: #27 Rico Salmela +12.303
P7: #66 Joel Kelso +12.580
P8: #11 Adrián Cruces +21.714
P9: #97 Marco Morelli +21.867
P10: #67 Casey O’Groman +22.305
The next race will be next weekend at the Red Bull Ring for the Austrian Grand Prix (18-20 September).