Last year Marquez along with Efren Vazquez (Derbi), Pol Espargaro (Derbi) and Sandro Cortese (Derbi), pushed Terol all the way to the chequered flag. This year Marquez, who won the 2010 125 title last year, has moved to the Moto2 class along with Espargaro so that was two less rivals for Terol to worry about. However, Vazquez and Cortese were both back in action, but this year were no match for Terol, who took the lead from the start and was never headed aas he stretched out to a comfortable 7.7 second win.
Terol’s Bankia Aspar team-mate Hector Faubel looked on course to make it a team 1-2 but mucked up under brakes in a corner, found himself in the wrong gear and was promptly pounced on by the chasing pack, eventually finishing 11th.
Cortese made the most of this and nailed down second
place, but the scrap for the final podium position was fierce. In the end it went to the experienced Sergio Gadea who won the first ever Qatar Grand Prix back in 2008. He edged out Vázquez and Jonas Folger for third.
Terol’s 7.7 second winning margin is a measure of how comfortable he was out in the lead. His race time, 38m 28.687s for the 18 laps was three seconds slower than his 2010 winning effort.
As this is the last year of the 125 GP class, it is worth recording the record-holders for the class. At Qatar, the race record belongs to Sergio Gadea at 38m 09.444s or 152.274 km/h set in 2008. The Lap record is held by Scott Redding at 2m 05.695s while the pole record is owned by Bradley Smith with a 2m 05.242s effort, also set in 2008.
Full results:
http://resources.motogp.com/files/results/xx/2011/QAT/125cc/RAC/Classification.pdf?v1_054ee67f