Enea Bastianini eased to a second straight Moto2 victory in the Czech grand prix at Brno as he held off Sam Lowes to win by just under a second.
The Italian made a rapid start to slingshot into the lead from third on the grid, relegating pole-man Joe Roberts to second while Lowes was relegated to fourth by Jorge Martin.
The Brit quickly dispatched the Spaniard to get back into the podium positions before switching his sights on Roberts, who he passed for second at Turn 4 on the second tour.
By this point Bastianini had stretched out his leading advantage to just over a second, a gap Lowes immediately set about reducing.
The Marc VDS racer managed to edge closer and closer across the first half of the contest, reducing Bastianini’s lead to around half-a-second before stalling out, the Italian’s Italtrans Kalex beginning to look the stronger prospect.
He then began to stretch his lead back out over the final stages of the race, extending his gap to just under a second-although Lowes made a late charge on the final lap to close to just four-tenths behind by the time the leading duo took the chequered flag after 19 relentless tours-Lowes securing his first GP podium in nearly four years.
Third went the way of Joe Roberts, the American Racing pilot scoring his first ever intermediate class rostrum result after a strong performance that while unable to stay with the leading pair, finished four seconds clear of Luca Marini on the leading VR46 bike.
Augusto Fernandez displayed significantly improved form meanwhile to bag his first top five result in what has so far been a trying first campaign with Marc VDS, the three-time Moto2 victor pressuring Marini for fourth in the latter stages.
The second VR46 Kalex of Marco Bezzecchi came home in sixth position, while Jorge Navarro managed to put a pass on Martin for seventh in the dying moments of the encounter.
Completing the top ten were the Aspar duo on their Speed Up bikes, Hafizh Syahrin leading Aron Canet for ninth.
Tetsuta Nagashima-who led the Moto2 riders standings heading into the Czech GP weekend- continued to struggle with the injury he picked up at Jerez on his way to 11th, the Japanese therefore slipping to third in the standings behind new leader Bastianini and Marini.
It was a tough day for the Dynavolt outfit, with top representative Marcel Schrotter clinging onto a point in 15th after dropping back towards the end of the race, while Thomas Luthi failed to score with a lowly 17th.
Dominique Aegeter enjoyed a solid Moto2 comeback ride as he managed to beat Lorenzo Baldassarri to 21st, the Swiss ace replacing the unwell Jesko Raffin at NTS for this weekend.
