Another Indian Rider Heads To The Dakar Rally And Fabio Aces MotoGP Jerez Doubleheader: Motorsport News Roundup

Dakar 2021

There’s still some time for Dakar 2021, but Ashish Raorane has already confirmed that he will be participating in this gruelling rally. One of the only Indian riders to compete as a privateer internationally, Raorane will be competing in the Malle Moto category, which means that competitors will have to race unassisted and carry out maintenance work themselves. Although Dakar will assist by providing a trunk, one set of wheels, one sleeping tent, a travel bag, and one set of tyres for each competitor.

Dakar 2021 will run once again in Saudi Arabia, but the route will be different. This route will be run from January 3 to 15 in a loop that will start from the Red Sea port city of Jeddah over 12 stages and conclude in Jeddah. 

MotoGP

MotoGP returned to Jerez for the second round of the 2020 season and it was mostly a race of survival rather than an out and out fight for the win. With Honda’s Marc Marquez unable to participate in the race, MotoGP’s latest winner from Fabio Quartararo continued his strong form from last week and dominated the race to take his second win in the premier class for Petronas Yamaha SRT. 

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The real race though was behind Quartararo as the two factory Yamahas of Valentino Rossi and Maverick Vinales fought for second place all race long with Vinales winning out in the end to make it a Yamaha 1-2-3. Nonetheless, Rossi’s return to the podium for the first time since Austin 2019 also marks the 41-year-old’s 199th podium in the premier class. Only 13 riders crossed the chequered flag with many retirements being either mechanical ones or rider crashes.  

F1

While on-track action took a break this week, off-track action didn’t stop as Nurburgring, Portimao and Imola joined the 2020 calendar to make it a 13-race season so far. F1 returns to Imola and the Nurburgring for the first time since 2006 and 2013, while it will be the sport’s first visit to the Algarve circuit in Portimao. These three races kick off with the EIFEL Grand Prix at the Nurburgring on October 11, followed by the Portugese Grand Prix in Portimao on October 25. Tentatively, the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix at Imola will play host to the season finale on November 1.

WRC

WRC has revealed route details for the upcoming fourth round of the season at Rally Estonia on September 4-6. The rally stage is based in Tartu, in the south of the country, with a total of 17 stages that will cover a route of 871.89km. Toyota’s Sebastian Ogier currently leads proceedings in the driver’s standings with Toyota Gazoo Racing leading the manufacturers’ standings. Could Thierry Neuville and Hyundai reduce the points gap to both Ogier and Toyota? All will be revealed once racing action resumes.

ERC

 

It was a strong debut for MRF Tyres in the season opener of the 2020 European Rally Championship (ERC) at the Rally di Roma Capitale. It was also MRF’s first test of its new rally-spec tyres. Craig Breen and co-driver Paul Nagle piloting a Hyundai i20 R5 were the top MRF crew with a close fourth place overall finish. The sister MRF of Emil Lindholm and co-driver Mikael Korhonen in the Skoda Fabia Rally2 evo finished tenth overall to cap off the season-opening 15-stage event. Next up is the Rally Liepāja, in Latvia which will be held between August 14 and 16.