2021 Austria Moto3 Race Result: Last Lap Rodeo

A sunny and bright Red Bull Ring left no questions about the weather this time around and allowed some more characters to join last Sunday’s main actors in the play for supremacy. Quite poetically, Sergio Garcia avenged last week's result with victory the second time around, after a lightning start, a race-long battle with a strong group and a perfect final lap. Deniz Öncü had to admit defeat on that last lap but adds a podium to last week’s pole, while Dennis Foggia completed the podium as the shining light for Honda.

Poleman Romano Fenati looked keen to break the pole curse as he kept the lead off the line, ahead of a fast-starting Öncü coming from the second row and the duo quickly started battling it out for the lead. While the two traded places early on, championship leader Pedro Acosta caught up with them from 7th on the grid and Garcia was just as quick to join the top five from his 13th starting position. The sizeable leading group included the likes of Tatsuki Suzuki and Ayumu Sasaki early on but while the former gradually lost touch with the podium battle, the later ended his race on lap six, in the gravel trap at the final corner with a helping nudge from Darryn Binder.

Öncü was leading proceedings by lap 9, with his fellow Red Bull KTMs in tow, but Masia, Fenati and Acosta all attacked over the next lap. As much as Fenati and Garcia tried, it was hard to keep the orange machines away from top spot, with Foggia the sole Honda in the mix at that stage but seemingly struggling to hold onto the leaders.

Öncü was back in the lead at the halfway mark of the race but the hierarchy seemed nowhere near settled amongst the leading group, with overtaking hotspots as busy as a kindergarten playground. The Petronas duo were keen to join that playground but couldn’t make much of an impact on the podium battle once they did and were later reeled in by Izan Guevara, who showed excellent late race pace.

The battle for second between the poleman and the Ajo boys helped Öncü have a bit of a breather up front for the next few laps but the Tech 3 man could not quite stretch a safe gap. After a more cautious first part of the race, Garcia started showing his intentions with 5 laps remaining, demoting Fenati and Masia to join the podium positions. The challenge to Öncü's lead came with 3 laps remaining, when Garcia lined up a move at turn 3 but Acosta quickly reacted to take the lead into turn 4. Öncü was quick to retaliate to retake the lead by turn 9 and start the final 2 laps in control. Foggia also started to mix it up for the podium positions and the somewhat messy shenanigans allowed Guevara to tag along to the lead group.

Öncü started the final lap in the lead and Acosta tried to attack early on at turn 3 but a wobble at turn 4 lost him some ground and left Garcia as favourite to challenge the leader. Garcia made the decisive overtake at turn 9 and held on to take victory and improve on last week’s result. After leading much of the race, Öncü settled for second, with Foggia robbing Acosta of the final podium spot. Poleman Fenati dropped to fifth late on, ahead of Masia, McPhee and Guevara. Binder dropped almost a second back, with Kaito Toba rounding out the top 10 places.

Garcia’s impeccable final lap recovers him some ground in the championship battle as well, the GASGAS rider 41 points behind his rookie compatriot. Fenati keeps third but is 89 points down on Acosta.

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