A historic win or another wake-up call for Supersport 300? It may seem one of these two things, but in any case what Ana Carrasco did was incredible, in such a spectacular cateogry like Supersport 300. The Spanish “Pink Warrior” dominated from the first till the last lap and meanwhile we saw big chaos behind her, including numerous crashes.
ELIMINATION RACE – The series was started by Nick Kalinin, who had a terrible crash in the third lap after the straight and even hit the wall (maybe because of a contact). Later Dani Valle, Enzo De La Vega, Maximilian Kappler and Ali Adrian Rusmiputro were involved in a group fall at Variante Alta. In the meantime Robert Schotman and Manuel González were trying to close the gap with Ana Carrasco, but at the fourth lap Schotman fell while while exiting Villeneuve corner and then was hit by González, who fell as well. This definitley helped Carrasco, since the two were recovering, and then we saw also the crash of Koen Meuffels at the final chicane, caused by a touch with Manuel Bastianelli (who fell some laps later).
BEHIND CARRASCO – Behind Carrasco, we saw an exciting battle for second place involving also Jan-Ole Jähnig, Luca Grünwald, Scott Deroue and Galang Hendra Pratama, who were later joined by Kevin Sabatucci, Mika Pérez and María Herrera. Riders overtook each ther many times, also with “exaggerated” moves, and the podium finishers were decided by the final lap. Deroue crashed few corners before the chequered flag by mistake and so second position seemed to be business of Sánchez, Grünwald and Jähnig, but a crazy overtake at Variante Alta took Sabatucci in front of the other three and so he crossed the line in second position. Finally Sabatucci was penalised for exceeding track limits during the overtake, but anyway he just went from second to third and so he scored a nice podium finish at his debut in WorldSSP300
THE REST – Behind Carrasco, Sánchez and Sabatucci, Assen winner Luca Grünwald crossed the finish line in fourth place followed by Pratama and Jähnig, while Herrera, Pérez, Glenn van Straalen and Walid Khan closed the top 10. Remarkable 12th place for Luca Bernardi, who made a great recovery after starting 39th and last (due to engine problems had in Superpole).