It had been 22 years since a Japanese rider had won in MotoGP, but, the cathedral of speed motorcycling. The 25-year-old rider, who arrived in the premier class as Moto2 champion last year, picked up the baton from 2004 to return glory to the country that has given the most motorcycles to the world with a display like a true veteran in the Netherlands GP, a busy race full of shocks throughout its 26 laps. The kid from Kiyose, a town located west of the Tokyo metropolitan area, showed his fine riding and innate speed with the RS-GP of Trackhouse, an American Aprilia customer team that finished off a perfect weekend by reversing the double of the ‘sprint’ on Saturday.
He was second on this occasion, accompanied by Jorge Martín who reached the podium and the leadership of the competition after the third consecutive zero of his teammate in the official Noale team and previous leader of the World Cup. Marco Bezzecchi suffered a hard fall on the second lap of the grand prix and had to be taken to the hospital, dazed but out of danger and with no apparent serious injuries after an initial check-up at the circuit clinic. “This podium tastes like gold, but above all I want to send all my support to Marco, it is never nice to see a rival fall like this,” said the third-place finisher, who has a seven-point margin over the Italian in the table.
Ogura’s victory also illustrated the maturation of the promotion categories, as he is the first talent cup rider in Asia to succeed in MotoGP. “It’s fantastic, but I don’t have much else to say, I just want to thank all my people. It was a difficult race, with a tough fight with Raúl. I lost a lot there, but my pace was good enough to come back and even escape at the end. If the numbers say so, I’m fighting for the championship,” said the Japanese, stoic even in his biggest victories and now fourth in the standings, 25 points behind the new leader.
The Japanese talent had to row hard to win the Assen TT, packed with more than 100,000 spectators this Sunday. Ogura made another good start and placed himself first in braking at one, but then he saw how poleman Martín regained his pulse and the lead in the race as had already happened in the ‘sprint’. The 2024 champion escaped in the early stages, but Fernández was able to close the gap after fighting with his teammate, who in the blink of an eye fell to sixth place. The Japanese driver was not intimidated, clinical in his overtaking in the famous chicane of the track, protagonist of several explosive battles in this edition.
At the halfway point of the race, it became clear that the Aprilias had one gear more than the rest in terms of pace. The second triplet in his history in MotoGP was tied, with more than five seconds of margin over the fourth place finisher, which finally amounted to nine at the finish line. Pedro Acosta, after a nice fight with the two red Ducatis that he will ride next year, had to abandon his right arm when he was running sixth. Then it was learned that he will have to undergo surgery. On lap 14, Pecco Bagnaia, the best of the rest, did the same by running out of brakes. The three-time Italian champion, by the way, rushed to the airport after learning in the morning of the birth of his first child in Italy.
Showing off his diesel style, from less to more in the long races, Ogura cut the second distance that Martín and Fernández had in the lead in a couple of turns, but then the rear height device got stuck and he lost all the ground he had recovered. It took him another couple of laps to chase them again, just when Raúl launched his attack for victory in the chicane on lap 17. In the first braking of lap 18, the Japanese took the opportunity to relegate Martín to third place and rule him out of victory in a matter of two corners. With seven laps to go, Ogura overtook his Spanish colleague with another delightful maneuver and escaped alone to his first MotoGP victory.
Behind them, there was an intense tug-of-war between the Márquez brothers and Fabio Di Giannantonio. The Italian in VR46 won the game, sending the defender of the crown into the gravel of the chicane on lap 20. He was penalized for that maneuver with a long lap that he completed on lap 23 and then proceeded to overtake him again on lap 25 to finish off the job by overtaking Alex on the last lap, a result that places him 16 points behind the new leader as the best and most consistent of the Desmosedici GP.
The world runner-up celebrated his fifth place as a triumph after his hard fall on Friday, which threatened to remove him from the grand prix. His brother, finally, was seventh after suffering like a man possessed in the physical section and going outside the limits of the circuit on the last lap, an action that made him lose sixth place at the finish line. The Catalan remains 40 points behind the leader, who simply changed his surname in Assen.
