MotoGP Austin: Moto3 race preview

Moto3 arrives at the Circuit of the Americas with a front-running fight on its hands ahead of the AmericasGP.

Solunion GASGAS Aspar’s Sergio Garcia vs Leopard Racing’s Dennis Foggia was an instant classic in Argentina last weekend. Both have underlined their speed in 2022 with Garcia once again sending it on Sunday and pulling off that final lunge to perfection as the number 11 tends to do. The stage could well be set for another showdown in Texas between the duo too, although there is last year’s winner and now teammate to Garcia, Izan Guevara, who’ll likely have different ideas about the weekend ahead. As well as the rest of the pretty packed grid…

Guevara and Garcia were the breakaway early on in Argentina before the number 28 suddenly suffered a technical problem, adding a dash of bad luck to the qualifying penalty that already dampened his charge in Qatar. If it had stayed as it was in Termas before that though, the sophomore would have been leading the Championship, equal on points with his teammate but the first of them to win.

Shoulda woulda coulda is often of little use in racing, but one time it can be relevant is when the points don’t quite reflect speed - especially judging a sophomore rider like Guevara against the wealth of experience of Garcia and Foggia. The number 28 appears to have gone under the radar for some in 2021, despite having arrived in Moto3 from winning the FIM JuniorGP World Championship as a rookie and winning a Grand Prix race as a rookie too, but it looks like it’s game on now.

So can anyone else keep challenging the sheer speed of Foggia, the send it masterclasses of Garcia and the elbows out of Guevara? So far, the next fastest rider – and sometimes fastest of all – has been Ayumu