Round 16 of the MotoGP World Championship at the Phillip Island circuit proved to be a tough one for the two Ducati Team riders. Andrea Dovizioso, who started from the fourth row of the grid for the Australian GP, was unable to gain any positions at the start and he crossed the line at the end of the opening lap in eleventh place. The Italian then braked very late for the first turn and dropped down to twentieth place. Despite a good recovery, which took him back up to eleventh place, Dovizioso was not able to make up any more places and at the final corner of the last lap he was overtaken by Redding and Pedrosa, finishing his race in thirteenth place.
Jorge Lorenzo, still in pain from his bad crash yesterday, remained in thirteenth place for much of the race, but in the last few laps he dropped to fifteenth and crossed the line in that position.
Following the Australian GP, Andrea Dovizioso still lies second in the championship standings, but he is now 33 points behind Marquez and 17 points ahead of Viñales.
MotoGP will be back on track in a few days’ time with round 17 of the championship, the Shell Malaysia Grand Prix.
Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team #04) – 13th
“Today’s race was a big disappointment and we really lost a lot of points in the championship. For sure my mistake in the early stages of the race complicated things and maybe even the choice of rear tyre was not the best one, but on this track our bike is still struggling a lot. This year we’ve managed to improve many aspects and be competitive throughout the season but when you come to tracks like this, where you don’t brake very much and where there are lots of long fast corners, some of our limits are magnified: in fact here at Phillip Island none of the Ducati were very quick. Pity, because at this point of the season it would have been better to be closer to Marquez in the standings, but now we have to think of Malaysia, where quite simply we’ll have to give it our all.”
Jorge Lorenzo (Ducati Team #99) – 15th
“It was a weekend to forget, because we were never able to be competitive. I started a long way down the grid and was unable to improve my position in the race: after ten or so laps I began to lap consistently and a few tenths quicker than yesterday, but when the performance of the rear tyre dropped it was impossible to keep that pace. In general here all the Ducatis suffered a lot, with the different choices of tyres available, but now we are going to Sepang with confidence, because it’s a track that is certainly better suited to our bike”.
