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| Sunday, October 23rd 2011, 07:03 GMT |
Thomas Luthi denied Stefan Bradl a chance to wrap up the Moto2 world championship by winning at Sepang, as Bradl's title rival Marc Marquez had to miss the race.
Injuries from his violent crash in Friday practice forced Marquez to sit out the Malaysian round. Since the crash on an unflagged wet patch right at the start of opening practice, Marquez had only completed two qualifying laps, and this morning it was finally confirmed that he was not fit enough to start.
That meant Bradl could win the championship with a race victory, and for much of the distance that result looked likely, as the German quickly passed polesitter Luthi's Interwetten Suter and then established a one-second advantage.
But Luthi closed in on the Kiefer Kalex and slid into the lead at the final corner with two laps to go.
Bradl stayed on his tail and might have retaliated, but the race was then red-flagged slightly early after Axel Pons had a heavy crash, ensuring Luthi claimed his first Moto2 win and leaving Bradl 23 points ahead of Marquez heading for Valencia.
Pol Espargaro took third place for Speed Up, with Alex de Angelis battling through to fourth on the JIR Motobi, just in front of Dominique Aegerter (Technomag-CIP Suter), Mika Kallio (Marc VDS Suter), Michele Pirro (Gresini Moriwaki) and Aleix Espargaro (Pons Kalex). Yuki Takahashi had been third on the other Gresini bike initially, before going off.
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Source: http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/95624
Niccolò Canepa Loris Capirossi Jose Luis Cardoso Carlos Checa
