Grand Prix 2000 - Round 12 - Estoril

Katoh led them into the 1st corner with Ukawa right behind him. West got a great start to immediately shoot to 5th.

Ukawa in to the lead on lap 2 as Checa and Debon head in to the gravel. Melandri 3rd.

Katoh back in the lead on lap 3. Waldmann down. West relegated to 6th by Jacque.

The top 5 are nearly nose-to-tail - Katoh, Ukawa, Melandri, Nakano, Jacque, West. No Ukawa down after losing the rear and Nakano could not avoid the incident and hit Ukawa's sliding bike. Nakano looks to have hurt his hand or forearm after being launched in to the air off of Ukawa's bike. If he gets away with only damage to his arm he can consider himself very lucky, that was a b-i-g crash for Nakano, Ukawa is unhurt as his rear end lose just ended up being a long gentle slide and did not result in a highside. Ukawa will be devastated also as many of the Honda hierarchy are at Estoril today and announced that Ukawa will be a full factory Honda 500 rider next year.

Race order - Katoh, Jacque, Melandri, West. 21 laps to go. Katoh is clearing out from Jacque and Melandri. West is pretty much on his own in 4th place with 18 laps to run.

15 laps to run and the order remains the same but Nohles and Nieto are closing a little on Anthony West.

Nohles is really starting to reel West in now with 11 laps to run, the gap now down to 4 seconds. A rear part of Anthony's fairing looks to be waving around in the wind a little more than it should, lets hope it holds together. The race order up front remains Katoh, Jacque and Melandri.

4 laps to go and the order remains the same. The gap between West and Nohles has closed a few tenths but Anthony looks to be able to hold on to his 4th position without too much trouble.

As they start the final lap Katoh has over 10 seconds on Jacque. A further 16 seconds separates Melandri in 3rd. West has 2.3 seconds over Nohles and will keep his 4th position.