The final stretch of the MotoGP calendar is on the horizon, as Bagnaia and Martin keep the battle for the title, as there are only 4 rounds remaining, with today’s Thailand GP taking part at Chang International Circuit.

Lights were off and 17th round of the calendar was underway, as the same scenario repeated from yesterday’s sprint race, Marini attacked at the start, but was quickly responded by Jorge Martin, as Francesco Bagnaia quickly climbed to 4th, but was suddenly overtaken by Brad Binder, as Alex Marquez took advantage of this situation, with the Ducati rider was riding on 6th.

First laps saw a big group chasing the race leader, as Martin was unable to create a gap on the lead, with several battles happening on track. These riders up front were Martin, Aleix, Binder, Marini, Alex, Bagnaia, Marquez, Quartararo and Raul Fernandez being almost a second behind the race leader. It was an atypical situation for the premier class, as this type of racing is more common to see at lower classes; but highly entertaining nevertheless.

As laps passed by, Jorge Martin was still ahead as race leader, with the South African rider Brad Binder putting some pressure on the championship leader, meanwhile Francesco Bagnaia had his own problems, as the Ducati rider was in a battle for 5th with Marc Marquez. With the Italian rider cutting the row against Marc Marquez and Aleix Espargaro, the top 5 separates from the rest of the riders, composed by Martin, Binder, Alex Marquez, Marini and Bagnaia.

Following laps were quite passive, as there was not many standings movement, with Bagnaia moving to 4th against Marini was the only exception; It was clear that the name of the game was tyre management, as the riders kept their distances and were precautionary for any attack. It was calm, until things started to unravel, as the 3rd place Alex Marquez lost control of the bike and fell to the concrete, as Bagnaia got promoted to 3rd, with both Binder and Martin still on his sight.

Battle at the front was starting to get intense, as Brad Binder was pushing hard at Jorge Martin, with the Spaniard unable to separate from the KTM rider, it was a matter of time for the KTM rider to attempt a move on the Pramac bike. Binder started to show the bike, as Jorge was able to bounce back for each attack for the KTM, with Bagnaia quickly sticking at the battle, so the race win was now a 3-horse battle.

What happened in the last five laps was pure fantasy, as Binder was finally able to snatch the race lead, after several attempts against Martin, with the Spaniard still on the toe of the KTM and ahead of Bagnaia, then Martin bounced back and responded with a superb brake against Binder and recovered the lead, as Binder kept the pressure on Martin, Bagnaia almost pulled the move of the decade, as the Italian went outside and was just centimeters to overtake both Binder and Martin, but the spaniard was able to block the Ducati and also the KTM on the same turn.

With Binder still was looking for a gap at the last lap, Martin blocked any move with superb braking, the Pramac bike crossed the line and won the Indonesian GP, with Binder crossing at 2nd, but penalized after exceeding track limits and demoted to 3rd, so it means that Francesco Bagnaia gets promoted to 2nd place.

Race results:

1. Jorge Martin /// 2. Francesco Bagnaia /// 3. Brad Binder
4. Marco Bezzecchi /// 5. Aleix Espargaro/// 6. Fabio Quatararo
7. Marc Marquez /// 8. Luca Marini /// 9. Fabio Di Giannantonio
10. Johann Zarco /// 11. Franco Morbidelli /// 12. Joan Mir
13. Enea Bastianini /// 14. Takaaki Nakagami /// 15. Raul Fernandez
16. Jack Miller /// 17. Augusto Fernandez /// 18. Pol Espargaro

DNF: Maverick Viñales, Alex Marquez, Miguel Oliveira

An instant classic saw Jorge Martin getting the second sweep of the season, and reducing the gap of the standings by just 13 points. 3 rounds to go, 111 available points, Malaysia in 2 weeks, A championship still yet to be claimed.