Moto2 Aragon Race: Injured Raul Fernandez takes stunning win

An injured Raul Fernandez gritted his teeth to win the Moto2 race.

You wouldn’t have believed that Raul Fernandez was injured watching his performance today taking a strong victory by five seconds at Aragon over his teammate Remy Gardner, less than a week ago Raul Fernandez had a training accident breaking the fifth metacarpal bone in his right throttle hand, this has been a source of much pain and anguish this weekend for the Spanish rider who has had to grit his teeth all weekend long and ride as competitively as he physically can to maintain the title fight, this included a strong qualifying which ensured he could start from P3 on the grid.

Right from the lights out Fernandez forgot all of his issues and pain, instantly arriving at the front with Sam Lowes trailing the Spanish rookie, all Fernandez had to do was hold his pace as he does so well and pray that Lowes didn’t try and engage in a fight for the win, for Lowes this wasn’t to be with the British rider joining the long list of riders who crashed out of the race allowing Fernandez to relax and manage the then seven-second gap to his teammate Remy Gardner in second place and take five championship points out of the hands of Gardner.

Fernandez proved his skill and class coming home with a superb victory equalling Marc Marquez’s 2011 record of five victories as a Moto2 rookie with his teammate Remy Gardner in second place with the title lead being reduced from 44 points to 39 with five rounds to go, for Fernandez this victory today could prove pivotal when it comes to deciding the Moto2 World Champion.

The Moto2 race was filled with crashes from the very start with Remy Gardner gaining a place thanks to Lowes’ crash and Hector Garzo’s crash behind him relieving some of the pressure on the Australian during the race, another rider who crashed was Marco Bezzecchi who sits in third place in the championship, his crash today surely spells the end of his title hopes for 2021.

We got to witness an exhilarating battle for third place on the podium with Augusto Fernandez and Jorge Navarro putting on a show for the fans swapping places multiple times every lap with their last corner lines playing pivotal in who would lead over the line, Navarro opting to take a wider line and take advantage of more speed on the straight whereas Fernandez would take a tighter corner and get overtaken, eventually Fernandez would mirror Navarro and was able to hold the Speed Up rider off to come home in P3 only 0.2 ahead of Navarro.

A rider who deserves all the praise today is Fermin Aldeguer, the stand-in rider has stunned taking an incredible P7 result overtaking a multitude of riders in the final laps including both IntactGP boys and Ai Ogura, do not write off Aldeguer for the future, at 16-years-old he has got a strong career ahead of him.

It was a good day for the American riders after some tough races, both Joe Roberts and Cameron Beaubier came home in the points with Celestino Vietti taking home P15. Another rider deserving of a mention is Manuel Gonzalez who won last weekends Supersport Race 2 at Magny Cours and finished in P17 today at Aragon on the MV Augusta.

Full Results – 

Featured image – MotoGP.com