Lorenzo Dalla Porta secured the 2019 Moto3 world championship in elegant fashion by winning the Australian GP at Phillip Island, while title rival Aron Canet crashed out early on.
Dalla Porta remained in the long leading train throughout the contest, with 23 bikes at one point making up the leading group.
The group dropped to 14 as the race entered its final stages as several riders crashed out, including front runners Kaito Toba and Gabriel Rodrigo.
Canet was running fourth early on and looking set to challenge for victory having displayed impressive speed during practice, but the MAX Racing rider tried to carry too much speed into Turn 1 heading onto the third lap.
The Spaniard tucked the front of his KTM as a result, sliding into the gravel and out of the race as well as championship contention.
The only man that could stop Dalla Porta from taking the title early was now Tony Arbolino, who needed the Italian to finish outside of the top 12 positions to have any chance of taking the points battle to Malaysia next weekend.
Dalla Porta’s Leopard Racing Honda looked consistently strong on the long front straight though, allowing him to lead the field heading into Turn 1 for the final time.
Tatsuki Suzuki was keen to snatch his second win of the season though and dived past at the Turn 4 hairpin, before Dalla Porta struck back to re-take the lead at Lukey Heights just seconds later.
Albert Arenas looked good to challenge for his own second victory of ’19 heading through the final couple of corners, but Dalla Porta had enough speed to hang on to his second consecutive win by just 0.077 and wrap up the riders title with two races to spare.
Leopard Honda’s fearsome straight line capabilities allowed pole-man Marcos Ramirez to recover from mid-pack to second at the death as he pipped Arenas to the position, while Suzuki dropped to fourth much like in Motegi last weekend over the final corners.
John McPhee rounded out the top five for Petronas SRT, while Darryn Binder managed an impressive sixth for the CIP Green Power KTM team.
Team-mate Tom Booth-Amos secured his best ever Moto3 world championship result with eighth on the second CIP machine just behind Ayumu Sasaki, while Arbolino and Stefano Nepa completed the top ten positions.
Celestino Vietti meanwhile triggered a frightening crash on the final tour as he high-sided on the exit of the Turn 4 hairpin, going down and being collected by Jaume Maisa in the process.
Masia as a result careered straight on into the gravel on the outside of Turn 5, both riders losing likely top ten finishes due to the incident.
Canet's second straight DNF meanwhile closes up the battle for the runners-up spot in the rider's standings, with Arbolino's ninth place and seven points moving him just 14 away while Ramirez's second place finish puts him just four points further back.
