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Team Abu Dhabi’s Rashed Al Tayer made a brilliant
start moving up from fourth to lead from Perez, Marcus
Jorgensen, Abdulrazzaq, Christophe Agostinho and Kasza.
The front four held point until lap 7 when Jorgensen
slowed and went out of the race, Mattia Fracasso passing
Agostinho a lap later.
The pace at the front was frantic with three seconds
splitting the lead trio, Perez and Abdulrazzaq both passing
Al Tayer on lap 12, Kasza moving up to seal third place on
lap 14, Al Tayer coming home in fourth ahead of a distant
Fracasso with Dmitry Tsukov in sixth.
Perez followed up his win with second place inMoto 2 to win
the UIM-ABP Aquabike Grand Prix of the Mediterranean,
the Frenchman’s first GP title in three years, but a post-
race 15 second penalty given to race winner Kasza for
not maintaining his lane at the start elevated Perez to top
spot, dropping Kasza to third behind Al Abdulrazzaq and
reflecting the GP podium positions.
Kasza made an apparent sensational start to lead from
Perez and Tsukov and was 20 seconds clear by lap 5, with
Abdulrazzaq making up for a dismal start running outside
the top ten but moving into fourth on lap 4 and up into
third a lap later.
Kasza was able to hold off a hard charging Perez for 12 of
the 17 laps and going on to take the chequered flag with
his lead cut to 3.92s, Abdulrazzaq nearly six seconds back.
Tsukov’s fourth place was his best result in the UIM-ABP
Championship, finishing ahead of Lars Akerblom and
Anton Pankratov.
AQUABIKE
Abdulrazzaq
chasing Perez in
tight title battle
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