Jack Miller's hopes of winning his first MotoGP sprint race at the Spanish Grand Prix have been thwarted agonisingly by a daring, penultimate-lap overtaking manoeuvre from his KTM teammate Brad Binder.

Queenslander Miller looked well set to take victory in the short-format race at Jerez on Saturday before Binder's audacious move, which nearly resulted in the South African taking a tumble, propelled him into a lead he held to the finish.

A stunned Miller never recovered from that surprise, subsequently making a mistake on turn six on the final circuit that enabled his old Ducati teammate and reigning champion Francesco Bagnaia to whip through for the runner's up spot and consign him to third place.

The race had been red-flagged on the opening lap when Franco Morbidelli and Alex Marquez were involved in a triple crash at turn two with championship leader Marco Bezzecchi, who flew off his bike into the gravel.

When the race restarted, Binder and Miller enjoyed a terrific duel, which was only decided by the South African's hair-raising overtake on the outside of turn six, with a move that he admitted had pushed him to the limit of his skills and bravery.

He had looked perilously close to sliding into the gravel but just held on to control his bike's front tyre, edge by and earn his second sprint win of the season.

"Of course, you don't want to do anything crazy. I have experience of wiping out a teammate and I promise you that I don't ever want to do that again," Binder told reporters after coming out on top in his first major race duel with his friend and teammate.

"Of course, you take a little bit more care but we're all here to race and we all want to win.

"I tried to stay super close to Jack. He had a great pace so to be able to fight until the end, push it through and come out with the win is incredible."

Miller looked a little shell-shocked to be beaten in this fashion, but shrugged: "At the end of the day, you fight them (teammates) like you fight anyone else. You don't want to take anybody out.

"That's the whole aim I guess. Obviously, he's the first guy you want to win.

"Don't get me wrong, Brad is my mate and I'm stoked to see him win and for KTM to win - but you're always trying to win yourself."