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Bagnaia wins Malaysia MotoGP sprint as Alex Marquez seals brotherly 1-2 / Photo: © AFP
Bagnaia wins Malaysia MotoGP sprint as Alex Marquez seals brotherly 1-2
Italy's Francesco Bagnaia won the Malaysian MotoGP sprint with a dominant performance Saturday while Alex Marquez was runner-up to seal second in the world championship behind brother Marc.
Ducati's Bagnaia led from pole and crossed the finish line in 19min 53.725sec at Sepang, as Marquez came home 2.259sec behind to create a historic family one-two in the driver standings.
Newly crowned world champion Marc Marquez was not racing because of injury and will miss the rest of the season after suffering a collarbone injury in Indonesia this month.
Fermin Aldeguer was third with Pedro Acosta and Franco Morbidelli completing the top five.
The 28-year-old two-time world champion Bagnaia, who secured pole for the third consecutive year, launched off to a smooth start to lead the race from start to finish.
Marquez was hot on his heels but the Spaniard was made to work hard to regain second place on his Ducati after he briefly dropped to third.
As the rest of the field jostled for position, Bagnaia was in a class of his own to secure the wire-to-wire victory.
Bagnaia's triumph was redemption for last year’s sprint heartbreak, which saw him suffer a crash after setting a lap record in qualifying.
U. Schmidt--BTZ
