Sam Lowes dominated today’s Moto2 race at Aragon to take an easy win over Alex Marquez.

The Brit led for all but a handful of corners in the 21 lap race, and came under no pressure as he coasted to the win by 3.289s over Marquez, who took his first ever Moto2 podium.

After his miserable time at Misano a fortnight ago, it’s been a happier and much improved Lowes this weekend, which he proved by taking pole yesterday.

At the green light today he got away well, but so did Marquez, and the Estrella Galicia 0,0 Marc VDS rider took the lead. But Lowes wasn’t having any of, it and within a few corners was back ahead.

From there nothing changed. The leading duo started to gap the rest, and Lowes slowly eked out a lead over the Spaniard.

Behind, Lorenzo Baldassarri was third but dropped to fourth on lap three when Thomas Luthi passed him. The Garage Plus Interwetten rider looked comfortable in third for a number of laps, but behind, Marquez’ team-mate Franco Morbidelli was on a charge.

Having deposed Idemitsu Honda Team Asia pilot Takaaki Nakagami on the lap 12, it took just two more laps before he was past Luthi and up into third, where he began to chase down his team-mate.

On the final lap Morbidelli had Marquez where he needed him and tried a move, but Marquez cut straight back inside to hold onto second as the pair crossed the line just 0.032s apart.

Behind, the big battle was among championship contenders Alex Rins and Johann Zarco who were locked in a three-way scrap for sixth with Baldassarri. Zarco never seemed quite as fast as the other two, who swapped places a few times in the final laps.

It was Rins who emerged the strongest, the Paginas Amarillas HP 40 rider taking sixth with Baldassarri seventh and Ajo Motorsport’s Zarco eighth.

The championship battle has now heated up further, with Lowes hinting he still may stand a chance, despite writing it off last month.

“For me there’s something about racing in Spain, we keep going fast here,” he said. “I felt good, if you look at the sessions I’ve done a lot of laps on old tyres and I think that showed today.

“It was one of my best ever races and I’ve maybe given myself a little bit of hope for the championship with four races to go.”

Brit Danny Kent’s torrid weekend continued as the Leopard Racing rider pulled into the pits on lap six. He did re-join, and finished the race a lap down.