Australia’s Phillip Island race track is one of the most beautiful in the world, but it’s known for having a bit of a wildlife problem. That is, unless your name is Andrea Iannone.
Let me start by saying that last night’s Australian MotoGP round was the best road race I’ve ever seen in my entire life. The Australia GP is one of the few that’s on at a time where us west coasters can watch it live, and a group of us editors from a variety of the different motorcycle sites gathered to watch it together.
The Moto 3 race was absolutely bonkers with the number of crashes in it, and by the end we were surprised anyone was left to finish the race. But the real magic happened for the MotoGP race. I won’t be the one to spoil it for you, but I will say the race came down to four riders who traded places until the very end and that it had a room full of people who write and think about motorcycles for a living and their non riding girlfriends and wives losing their shit for almost an entire race. If you’ve ever wanted to give MotoGP a try or wanted to try and get your friends into it, it’s never been easier than right here.
One of the guys I watched it with last night is Rennie Scaysbrook, Road Test Editor for CycleNews. Rennie is an Australian who’s ridden Phillip Island a number of times, and during the fairly boring Moto 2 race was telling us about how he was there on a Suzuki GSX-R1000 once and obliterated a seagull. An hour later, Andrea Iannone gave us a demonstration.
While it looks like Iannone head butts the bird, post race footage showed a massive chunk taken out of the front left corner of the fairing where the seagull hit. Everyone but the bird were fortunate enough to make it through the ordeal intact, and Iannone went on to ride a fantastic race.
Click here for the final race results and current 2015 season standings and tune in next Saturday night for Malaysia.