Crutchlow wins Australian Moto GP as Marquez crashes

Britain’s Cal Crutchlow held off an extraordinary ride from Valentino Rossi to win the Australian Motorcycle Grand Prix on Sunday as newly-crowned world champion Marc Marquez crashed out with 18 laps to go.
Marquez, who clinched his third world title last weekend in Japan, led the race from pole position and was well clear of Crutchlow when he crashed due to a braking error at turn four of the Philip Island circuit.
That handed the lead to Crutchlow who showed steady nerves to hold out the hard-charging Rossi who climbed through the field from 15th place on the grid after his worst qualifying performance in five years.
Maverick Vinales was third after starting in 13th place.
The win gave the 30-year-old Honda rider Crutchlow his second Moto GP victory after his win in the Czech Republic earlier this year, making him the first Briton since Barry Sheen to win two races in the premier class in the same season.
He completed the race in 40 minutes, 48.5 seconds, holding out Rossi by 4.2 seconds.
The rainy conditions which made practice and qualifying tricky on Friday and Saturday gave way to fine but cold weather on Sunday. The cool track surface made tire choice critical and Crutchlow, starting from second place on the grid, followed Marquez in choosing a hard compound for the front tire.
It was a risky strategy given that partly cloudy conditions mad it difficult to keep heat in the tire. When Marquez went down it was thought that tire choice might have played a part and Crutchlow admitted to a moment of concern.
“I was terrified,” Crutchlow said. “I went really weak into that corner for the whole race.
“I knew it was critical towards the end of the race. I crashed there two years ago when I had 10 seconds behind me also. I was quite scared to be honest and I didn’t want to make the same mistake but I knew I had to keep pushing or we’d lose the heat in the front tire.”
Marquez dismissed tire choice as a factor in his fall which left him unhurt.
“First of all I want to say sorry to my team because I did the mistake,” Marquez said. “I braked too late and instead of trying to go a little bit wide I tried to keep the line and I fell.
“I was taking a lot of risks there at the beginning but in the end we have to be happy because we won the title but of course we would like to win more races.”
Rossi’s extradinary ride to claim second allowed him to extend his lead over Jorge Lorenzo in second place on overall championship standings with two rounds remaining. Riders head to Malaysia for the penultimate round of the season next weekend AP