Title fight to go down to wire after Lorenzo wins in Japan

Jorge Lorenzo managed to keep his hopes of winning this year’s MotoGP championship alive in Japan on Sunday, after beating out current title favorite Marc Márquez at the Motegi circuit.

The Yamaha rider started the race from pole position, and held his lead right from the start. The two-time world champion was put under plenty of pressure from rookie rider Márquez and his Honda teammate Dani Pedrosa, but of the three Spaniards, Lorenzo emerged victorious, notching up his seventh win of the season.

Márquez crossed the line just three seconds behind Lorenzo, with Dani Pedrosa trailing in a second later.

The result means that the fight for the riders’ title will go right down to the wire, with the winner to be decided at the season finale in Valencia on November 10. Márquez is set to become only the second driver in the sport’s modern history to win the championship in his very first season in the series. He could have sewn up the title last Sunday in Australia, but was disqualified from that race for failing to make an obligatory pit stop according to the stipulations of the event organizers.

Márquez, who is just 20 years old, is leading the championship, with 318 points. But the gap to second-placed Lorenzo is just 13 points, with 25 points up for grabs for the winner in Valencia. Pedrosa, meanwhile, is now out of the title hunt.

There was also good news for Spain in the Moto2 and Moto3 categories. Spanish rider Pol Espargaró took the win at Motegi, and also clinched the championship, his 265 points putting him out of reach of second-placed Scott Redding from the UK. And in Moto3, Alex Márquez (the younger brother of Marc) took his maiden win, beating fellow countryman Maverick Viñales to the line by just 0.027 seconds. The Valencia race will decide the winner between Spaniards Luis Salom, Viñales and Alex Rins.