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MotoGP Austria: Andrea Iannone takes first win in Ducati 1-2

Andrea Iannone claimed his maiden MotoGP win to lead a Ducati 1-2 in the Austrian Grand Prix and end its run of nearly six years without a victory

Ducati last won a MotoGP race at Phillip Island in October 2010 with Casey Stoner, 2128 days and 101 grands prix ago.

The Red Bull Ring was viewed as the ideal opportunity to end that drought, and Iannone and team-mate Andrea Dovizioso both qualified on the front row, split by Yamaha's Valentino Rossi.

In the opening laps, Rossi took the fight to the Ducatis and his team-mate Jorge Lorenzo even led briefly, while Honda's Marc Marquez and Maverick Vinales were also in the mix.

When the frenetic early action settled down, Iannone led the way, ahead of Dovizoso, Lorenzo, Rossi and Marquez.

Dovizioso took the lead on lap 10 at Turn 9, and while Marquez and Vinales subsequently drifted further behind, the Ducatis could not shake the Yamaha pair.

The margin ebbed and flowed by a matter of tenths, but entering the final 10 laps Dovizioso and Iannone were able to up their pace and pull away again to be more than one second clear.

Having gambled on a soft front tyre and medium rear compared to the medium fronts and hard rears of his rivals, Iannone then repaid Dovizioso's earlier move at the penultimate corner on lap 21.

With seven tours to go, that initially helped the Yamaha pair chip back into the margin by a couple of tenths, but Iannone proved his mettle.

Including setting the fastest lap of the race, a 1m24.561s with four to go, Iannone edged away to lead by nearly half a second.

The job was done and he brought it over the line to deliver a victory both he and Ducati craved, while Dovizioso had to settle for second.

The Yamahas faded in the closing laps to finish more than three seconds behind, with Lorenzo third to end a run of three torrid races without a podium, while Rossi followed him all race but had to settle for fourth.

Racing despite dislocating his left shoulder on Saturday morning, Marquez took fifth place.

The Honda rider maintains a healthy championship lead of 43 points over Lorenzo and 57 over Rossi.

Vinales fell off the back of Marquez in the second half of the race and was sixth on his Suzuki, ahead of Dani Pedrosa, who was a lonely seventh.

Pramac Ducati's Scott Redding was the best of the satellite riders in eighth, just ahead of Tech3 Yamaha pair Bradley Smith and Pol Espargaro.

Eugene Laverty ran as high as eighth, but lost several places and was then forced off at the final corner by Danilo Petrucci.

Five riders were handed ride-through penalties for jumping the start: Cal Crutchlow, Hector Barbera, Yonny Hernandez, Alvaro Bautista and Stefan Bradl.

Of the pack, Crutchlow was also one of the big losers on the first lap, falling from seventh on the grid to 16th, and eventually finished in 15th.

Barbera was disqualified for not serving the penalty in the required time, which he attributed to not seeing the message on his dash.

Laverty and Barbera had scored points in every grand prix in 2016, but Marquez is now the only rider with that record.

RACE RESULT

Pos Rider Team Gap Laps
1 Andrea Iannone Ducati 39m46.255s 28
2 Andrea Dovizioso Ducati 0.938s 28
3 Jorge Lorenzo Yamaha 3.389s 28
4 Valentino Rossi Yamaha 3.815s 28
5 Marc Marquez Honda 11.813s 28
6 Maverick Vinales Suzuki 14.341s 28
7 Dani Pedrosa Honda 17.063s 28
8 Scott Redding Pramac Ducati 29.437s 28
9 Bradley Smith Tech3 Yamaha 29.785s 28
10 Pol Espargaro Tech3 Yamaha 37.094s 28
11 Danilo Petrucci Pramac Ducati 39.765s 28
12 Michele Pirro Ducati 39.766s 28
13 Loris Baz Avintia Ducati 44.284s 28
14 Tito Rabat Marc VDS Honda 45.004s 28
15 Cal Crutchlow LCR Honda 1m03.246s 28
16 Alvaro Bautista Aprilia 1m12.448s 28
17 Yonny Hernandez Aspar Ducati 1m14.517s 28
18 Eugene Laverty Aspar Ducati 1m36.510s 28
19 Stefan Bradl Aprilia 1 Lap 27
- Aleix Espargaro Suzuki Retirement 24
- Hector Barbera Avintia Ducati Disqualified 12
- Jack Miller Marc VDS Honda Withdrawn 0

RIDERS' STANDINGS

Pos Rider Points
1 Marc Marquez 181
2 Jorge Lorenzo 138
3 Valentino Rossi 124
4 Dani Pedrosa 105
5 Maverick Vinales 93
6 Andrea Iannone 88
7 Andrea Dovizioso 79
8 Pol Espargaro 78
9 Hector Barbera 65
10 Scott Redding 53
11 Eugene Laverty 53
12 Aleix Espargaro 51
13 Jack Miller 42
14 Bradley Smith 42
15 Cal Crutchlow 41
16 Stefan Bradl 37
17 Alvaro Bautista 35
18 Danilo Petrucci 29
19 Michele Pirro 23
20 Tito Rabat 20
21 Loris Baz 11
22 Yonny Hernandez 3


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