Tech3 KTM’s Oliveira snatches MotoGP win in wild finish

Miguel Oliveira took his and the Tech3 team’s first-ever MotoGP win in an outrageous finish to the Styrian Grand Prix at the Red Bull Ring.

The race had been temporarily suspended midway through due to a big incident, much like the previous week’s Austrian Grand Prix at the same venue.

Oliveira took advantage of a last-lap duel between fellow KTM rider Pol Espargaro, also chasing his maiden win, and Jack Miller, trying for his Pramac team’s first-ever victory, to sweep by exiting the final corner and win.

Sixteen laps of the Styrian GP were completed by the time Yamaha rider Maverick Vinales, having slumped from sixth to 13th with what looked like another technical issue, appeared to lose braking power on the run to the sharp Turn 1 right-hander.

He was forced to let go of the bike while it was still upright, and the Yamaha travelled through the run-off at speed before a hard impact against the air fence, which left the fence demolished and the M1 in flames.

Poleman Espargaro had got a decent launch off the line during the initial start but surrendered the lead into Turn 1 as Suzuki’s Joan Mir dived down the inside.

The KTM man was then reeled in by Miller through the two subsequent straights and pushed wide, nearly colliding with the LCR Honda of Takaaki Nakagami as he rejoined the racing line in fourth place.

And when Mir was ordered to drop one position for having run wide during his Turn 1 pass for the lead, it wasn’t Espargaro but Miller that he had to yield to.

But Suzuki rider Mir weathered subsequent attacks from Nakagami before retaking the lead from Miller at the final corner on the third lap.

With Espargaro struggling for pace early on and having to defend hard from Alex Rins, the front three made an early breakaway, before Mir broke up their mini-pack by establishing a half-second advantage.

This turned into a second’s gap as the race passed the 10-lap mark, and then two seconds around the halfway point, as Nakagami launched his Honda down the inside of Miller at the final corner, only to get swallowed back up by the Ducati on the run out of Turn 1.

By the time Nakagami got past Miller again, Mir had escaped even further, but the 11-minute red-flag stoppage wiped out his advantage as the grid re-formed for a 12-lap dash to the finish.

Mir managed another superb launch off the line once the race resumed, yet a seemingly-slow starting Miller used the Ducati’s grunt to get Espargaro for what was now second place exiting Turn 1, and then move into the lead on the run down to the Turn 4 right-hander.

And with Mir unable to fit a new front tyre for the restart unlike many of his rivals, he soon came under pressure from Espargaro – who had been caught out by a tyre shortage after a red flag the week before.

This time, Espargaro moved past Mir at the Turn 3 hairpin on the fifth lap after the restart, before launching a Turn 1 attack on Miller the next lap. He ran wide, however, and baulked Mir on the straight, allowing KTM stablemate Miguel Oliveira to move up to third.

Two laps later, Espargaro cleared Miller at the fast final right-hander to retake the lead for the first time since the initial start, yet Miller stayed with him until the final lap – the pair briefly appearing to shake Oliveira and make it a one-on-one duel for victory.

But Oliveira closed back up and would be presented with a prime opportunity to pounce on the final tour.

As Espargaro took a defensive line into Turn 3, Miller managed a better exit and lunged down the inside of Espargaro at the next corner to take the lead.

Espargaro shadowed Miller all through the rest of the lap and looked to have got the overtake done at Turn 9, only for Miller to hang on to the inside line and run both himself and Espargaro wide at the final corner.

Miller had Espargaro beat to the line, but Oliveira had been close enough to capitalise and surge past both, snapping Ducati’s unbeaten Red Bull Ring streak by three tenths of a second.

Mir had briefly slumped to fifth but recovered to take fourth late on from Andrea Dovizioso, and finished just a tenth off the podium.

Dovizioso has closed to within three points of championship leader Fabio Quartararo, who struggled after the restart and finished 14th.

Rins was left to rue a poor start but did ultimately clear Nakagami for sixth, the LCR Honda rider having paid the price for being run out wide by Dovizioso and Brad Binder at Turn 4 after the restart.

But Binder himself then wide at Turn 1, and had to fight hard to stay ahead of Valentino Rossi, who finished as the highest-placed Yamaha, and Iker Lecuona, the rookie recording a second consecutive top-10 on what was a great day for his Tech3 outfit.

Avintia Ducati rider Johann Zarco was forced to start from the pitlane after being penalised for the previous week’s shunt with Franco Morbidelli, which also required Zarco to go into surgery for a broken scaphoid on Wednesday.

Zarco had recovered to 18th by the time the red flag flew, and would ultimately pick up two points for 14th, having overtaken Morbidelli – the Petronas SRT Yamaha rider struggling ever since catching a near-highside exiting Turn 1 after the initial start.

Race Results