It was not an easy ‘home race’ for the Swiss at the Sachsenring. In the Moto3 qualifying he did not get beyond 26th place, so Dettwiler had to start the race from the last place on the grid. Thanks to the penalties of his colleagues Joel Esteban, Matteo Bertelle, Joshua Whatley and Filippo Farioli, he at least moved up to 22nd place. But the race did not end as planned.
Fall ends fight for points
The early stages of the race went well for Dettwiler and gave him hope of scoring World Championship points since the Grand Prix in Austin, when he scored his only points so far. Benefiting from the numerous long lap penalties handed out by the stewards before the race, the CIP driver moved up to 16th place and was fighting to score points.
But on lap 14, the hope of scoring points came to an abrupt end: Dettwiler crashed on lap 14 with a highside. In conversation with Motorsport-Magazin.com the 19-year-old explained his crash. “I’m OK,” he said after the race. “I was behind a driver who overtook me and who had a penalty and I wanted to stay with him. I went a bit wide in turn four and then accelerated a bit too early, which is why I had a highside.”
Noah Dettwiler: I showed that I belong here
Fortunately, Dettwiler was uninjured and was able to continue the race. “I was lucky that the bike was still running.” Afterwards, the rookie was annoyed about the missed opportunity for points. “It’s a shame because the race up to that point wasn’t bad at all. We didn’t have a bad start and were able to keep up well at the beginning. I then made two or three mistakes, but it still wasn’t bad if we look at the whole weekend,” he said, looking on the positive side. “I think I might have had the rhythm to ride with the group in front of me. But yes, now we’ve tested the limit, that happens sometimes. Unfortunately no points, but at least a positive feeling from the weekend.”
This means that Dettwiler also ends the ninth stop of the year without any points. In the drivers’ standings, he is in 24th place with the two points from the United States. His protégé Tom Lüthis has mixed feelings about the first half of the season. “It’s certainly not great to go into the summer break with the crash, but at least the laps we drove weren’t that bad. We showed that we can drive these times.”
“That was definitely not an easy first half,” said Dettwiler, looking back on the previous nine races. “We’ve had to eat hard so far, but I think we’re still looking forward. We’ve had some good moments here and there where we were still able to show that we belong here. We just have to make sure that we become more consistent and that that spark, when it comes, stays.”