Moto2 Valencia-1 FP2: Enea Bastianini dethrones Sam Lowes

It is as a strong man in the category that Sam Lowes arrives (Kalex, EG 0,0 Marc VDS) on the Valencia route. The Englishman indeed won his third Moto2 victory at MotorLand Aragón. It was the third victory of the season for Lowes, who ties Enea Bastianini (Kalex, Italtrans Racing Team) and Luca Marini (Kalex, SKY Racing Team VR46), his closest rivals for the title. He now leads the Moto2 championship for the first time since after the 2016 Italian Grand Prix.

Enea Bastianini finished third in Teruel, representing his seventh podium of the season, more than any other rider and one more podium than Lowes, which has six. Third in the championship, Luca marini finished 11th at the Teruel Grand Prix, which was his second worst result this season since the French Grand Prix. Losing momentum, he must get his act together this weekend or risk losing his chance of a coronation this year.

Topics of discussion also concern the weather, particularly bad yesterday above Cheste and expected to improve a little today. This afternoon, the track is dry on the lines, with temperatures of 20° in the air and 19° on the ground.

Lorenzo Baldassarri (Kalex, Flex Box Pons HP 40) will celebrate its 24th anniversary on the opening day of this European Grand Prix. Before blowing out the candles and opening hostilities, here is the table which summarizes the facts hitherto known on the Ricardo Tormo route...

Valencia Europe Moto2™	2019	2020
FP1	1'35.699 Stefano Manzi	1'48.975 Tom Lüthi
FP2	1'34.622 Brad Binder	1'36.804 Enea Bastianini
FP3	1'34.463 Brad Binder
Q1	1'34.873 Marcel Schrötter
Q2	1'34.461 Jorge Navarro
Warm up	1'35.062 Stefano Manzi
Course	Binder, Lüthi, Navarro
All time lap record	1'34.461 Jorge Navarro (2019)

Hafizh Syahrin is still suffering from his fall in the morning…

After the first 10 minutes which see Jake Dixon (Kalex, Petronas Sprinta Racing) suffer a severe highside at turn 4, while Sam Lowes (Kalex, EG 0,0 Marc VDS) directs operations in front Fabio di Giannantonio (Speed ​​Up, +Ego Speed ​​Up) and Joe Roberts (Kalex, American Racing).

The Briton is in 1'36.865 at the end of his fifth flying lap, and if we argue behind him for the place of runner-up between Joe Roberts, Baldassarri and Tom Lüthi (Kalex, Liqui Moly Intact GP), driver Marc VDS does not let go of the lead.

At the end of the first run, Sam Lowes precede Joe Roberts, Lorenzo Baldassarri, Tom Lüthi, Nicolò Bulega, Jorge Martin, Fabio Di Giannantonio, Héctor Garzó, Xavi Virginie, Marcel Schrötter, Marco Bezzecchi, Remy Gardner and Somkiat Chantra.

However, nothing is certain and eight minutes from the checkered flag, Sam Lowes made a mistake by slowly losing the front in turn 8 while he was still improving his time.

Three minutes from the end of the session, Joe Roberts produces his effort and gets closer to less than a 10th of a second from the Marc VDS driver…

The final rush sees Enea Bastianini, then 12th, propelled himself to the top of the ranking thanks to a 1'36.804.

FP2 classification of the Moto2 European Grand Prix in Valencia:

Classification credit: MotoGP.com