VALIANT 6TH FOR ARBOLINO IN INDONESIA - LOWES 10TH

Tony Arbolino fought until the very end at the Mandalika Street Circuit to score 10 important points for 6th place, while Sam Lowes came home in 10th.

73,129 people were in attendance to watch the 2nd ever Grand Prix held at the Mandalika Street Circuit in Indonesia on Sunday, the biggest of the weekend so far.

Like the previous two days, track temperatures were among the hottest of the year, at 60 degrees. That meant Elf Marc VDS Racing Team riders Sam Lowes and Tony Arbolino had to take care of Dunlop’s soft rear tyre option for the 22-lap Moto2 race.

Starting from 8th on the grid, Sam was pushed back to 14th in the usual Moto2 melee at Turn 1 and then consolidated his position in the opening laps.

The Briton then launched his recovery, picking up four places by lap 8. But Sam’s progress was stalled when pushed wide by Joe Roberts on the 16th lap, causing him to drop 2 places. In the end he came home 10th.

This result keeps Sam in 13th place in the World Championship with 80 points to his name.

Fighting through from 10th on the grid, Tony was 6th through the 1st sector before passing Somkiat Chantra and Fermin Aldeguer in quick succession to end lap 1 in 4th.

By lap 4, the Italian was up to 3rd. But soon after he started to suffer reduced performance from his rear tyre. After a good fight with Manuel Gonzalez and Jake Dixon, the 23-year old lost 5th place on the penultimate lap due a big slide at Turn 5.

Tony stays in 2nd place in the World Championship fight with 212 points, 65 behind leader Pedro Acosta.

SAM LOWES, 10th

“Of course, we’re not happy to finish 10th. But the conditions were difficult and I didn’t have the feeling I wanted, especially in the 2nd half of the race. My start was bad because I was a bit nervous, maybe after the last couple of results. Then after that when I got some clear track I expected to come forward. Then we had an issue with the rear of the bike that was out of my and the team’s control. It was unfortunate as we didn’t come forward like I expected. But it was important to finish and we have something to build on for Australia, where it’ll surely be a few degrees cooler than today! It was a complicated race so we have to take the positives. There were some good points, and I was fast in some sessions. We’ll keep working to improve and get back to the level where we should be.”

TONY ARBOLINO, 6th

“It was a good race for the first laps. I tried so hard to push a lot and do some different things to be faster today. Everything was going well more or less but then I had a problem with the rear tyre, like a lot of riders. I was losing the grip on corner entry and I was risking a lot to do the same pace as before. We need to understand why we were losing there before we travel to Australia so we can be faster there. Let’s see how it goes.”