Romano Fenati claimed victory at the Circuit of the Americas for the second year in succession after pre-race favourite Aron Canet crashed out of the lead in Austin. The Italian was rewarded for piling the pressure on the polesitter who eventually high-sided while battling for the lead with Fenati.
For Canet, the race will go down as a tale of what might have been with the Spaniard looking in a comfortable position when the race was red flagged on lap three. Canet had already gapped the chasing group being led by Joan Mir but with Kaito Toba having crashed and requiring trackside attention, race direction correctly halted proceedings.
At the restart, Mir fell backwards as Fenati took the fight to Canet. Given the pace advantage the Estrella Galicia rider appeared to have in his pocket, Romano knew the only way of challenging was to upset the rhythm of the teenager. Although a forceful move at turn twelve didn’t pay off, Fenati was soon rewarded with the lead when Aron suffered a dramatic high side at turn nineteen.
With the favourite out of contention, Fenati eased away to a first win since Austin 2016 while Jorge Martin fought his way to the front of the chase group to finish second, maintaining his 100% podium record in 2017. Fabio Di Giannantonio followed his team-mate home in third while Enea Bastianini and Nicolo Bulega put disappointing starts to the season behind them with fourth and fifth respectively.
Juanfran Guevara rode a fine race to finish sixth ahead of John McPhee with Joan Mir pushed all the way down to eighth in a chaotic battle for the podium spots. Philipp Oettl was ninth while Darryn Binder rounded out the top ten.
Moto3 Red Bull Grand Prix of the Americas: Race Result
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