Rins' Solid Phillip Island Race Pace Earns Him P7, Quartararo Salvages P11

An overcast Sunday at the Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit set the scene for the Australian Motorcycle Grand Prix Race. Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP's Álex Rins enjoyed battling with rivals to take 7th place. Fabio Quartararo didn't find the race pace he was looking for and finished the 27-lap contest in 11th position.

Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP's Álex Rins made up for a challenging start in today's Australian Motorcycle Grand Prix Race by charging from P11 to P7 in the latter stages of the 27-lap Race. Starting from pole, Fabio Quartararo was briefly in contention for a podium finish but struggled to defend his position and ultimately held P11 across the finish line.

Rins started from P11 and held 12th at the end of the first lap. He was back in 11th when Jack Miller crashed on lap 5. The number-42 closely followed the train of rivals ahead of him but couldn't find a way through. On lap 14, he was overtaken by Enea Bastianini. Rins in turn overtook Quartararo on lap 15, putting him in 11th place again. He then closed the gap to the top 10. With eight laps to go, he launched a successful attack on Pol Esparagó to move up to tenth, and he upped his pace further for a late charge. With five laps to go, the Yamaha man polished off Bastianini. Brad Binder followed one lap later, and with Fermín Aldeguer running wide, Rins was up to seventh. Considering the over 3s gap to the next rider ahead of him, he focused on pushing to the chequered flag on the final three laps. He still managed to close the gap by one second and finished in seventh place, crossing the finish line 10.671s from first.

Quartararo started from pole and soon slotted into fourth place. A significant gap of over 1.5s to the top 3 had formed after the first laps, but the Frenchman kept his head down. Marco Bezzecchi ahead of him had to complete two long-lap penalties. When the Italian completed the second one on lap 7, it briefly moved El Diablo up to third. The top 2 were about 1s ahead of him at the time, but over the next eight laps he was relegated to twelfth as the riders who had bunched up behind overtook him one by one. With five laps to go, Francesco Bagnaia also passed him briefly, but the Italian crashed one lap later, putting Quartararo back in 12th. As Aldeguer dropped down the order in the final stages, the number-20 rider ultimately finished in 11th place, 16.965s from the winner.

After today's results, Quartararo stays in 9th place in the overall standings with 166 points, and Rins holds 19th position with 60 points. Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP are 6th in the team championship with 226 points, and Yamaha remain in 5th position in the constructor championship with 205 points.

MotoGP will be back in action next week for the Grand Prix of Malaysia, held at the Sepang International Circuit from 24-26 October.