PORTIMAO, Portugal :Aprilia's Marco Bezzecchi delivered a commanding lights-to-flag victory at the Portuguese Grand Prix on Sunday, claiming his second win of the season and strengthening his grip on third place in the championship with just one round remaining.
The polesitter made amends for a lacklustre Saturday sprint performance, where he could only manage third, by controlling the race from start to finish ahead of Gresini Racing's Alex Marquez and KTM's Pedro Acosta.
Bezzecchi's dominance was emphatic, as he finished more than 2.5 seconds clear of Marquez to become the sixth different winner in the last six MotoGP races, while Acosta's late race pace had him close in on his compatriot but settled for third.
Ducati's Francesco Bagnaia, who is battling with Bezzecchi for third in the championship behind champion Marc Marquez and runner-up Alex, crashed out of fourth place and finds himself 35 points behind before the final round in Valencia.
'FANTASTIC RACE' FOR BEZZECCHI
"It was a fantastic race for me. This morning I felt better and yesterday evening we worked a lot in the box to try to find that last step that we missed," Bezzecchi said.
"I was super afraid of Pedro and Alex because yesterday they were super quick, but I was also very motivated to try to get a win... I'm very happy, super important to be back on the top of the podium."
Just as in the sprint, Bezzecchi took the lead into turn one ahead of Acosta while Marquez moved up from fifth to third again, before the Gresini Racing rider then used the KTM's slipstream at the start of lap two to move up to second.
But unlike the sprint, there was no wheel-to-wheel battle this time as Bezzecchi and Marquez peeled away. Before long, the three riders were split by nearly
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