Two weeks after his Mugello triumph, Jorge Lorenzo today made it two in a row by winning the Catalan GP at the Montmeló circuit. The rider from Mallorca, who started from pole, moved into the lead of the race on lap 2 when he passed Marquez, and then firmly held onto that position right until the chequered flag, finishing over four seconds ahead of his Honda rival.
Rossi’s third place keeps him in second position in the championship standings with 88 points, 11 points ahead of teammate Viñales, who remains in third position. Yamaha moved down to third place below leader Honda and now ducati in the Constructor Championship, with a 26-point margin to first, while the Movistar Yamaha MotoGP Team remain in first position in the team standings and now have a 10-point gap to the second team.
It was an unfortunate race for Andrea Dovizioso, who also started from the front row after going third-quickest in qualifying yesterday. The Italian crashed under braking for Turn 5 when he was in third and had to retire.
Lorenzo has now moved up to seventh place in the overall standings on 66 points, followed by Dovizioso with the same haul, while Ducati now lie second overall in the Constructors’ championship with 132 points.
Jorge Lorenzo
“Today’s win was really fantastic! We showed that we can win not only by entering the first turn in first place, but also by recovering and overtaking the others. It was actually a complicated race because I got off to a bad start and lost a lot of metres to Marquez, but I told myself that the race was long and I had to keep calm. It wasn’t too difficult to take Marc, because I had that little bit extra under braking, but he stayed pretty close to me right down to the flag. Now we’ve got a very competitive package and I think that this is the most complete Ducati bike of all time: both Dovi and I this weekend have always been competitive. We must capitalize on this situation because the Desmosedici works well at virtually every track, it doesn’t consume the tyres too much, and this is a big advantage. Now let’s enjoy this win and then we’ll think about the next race.”
Marc Marquez
“Today was a race where we had to manage as best as possible and I tried to be smart. Of course in the first laps I pushed hard because it was important to follow Jorge and to open a gap on the chasers. When we built a comfortable advantage I just managed the pace. I even slowed down a bit in the final part of the race as it was impossible to catch Lorenzo. I saw many crashes, which made me think more than I did in other races. Sometimes the tyre choice you make doesn’t result in the exact feeling you were hoping for, but I think that second is very good for the Championship because we arrived here with a 23-point lead and go to Assen with 27. It’s time to understand how the situation is and try and manage it as best as possible. We made a mistake in Mugello and that had me thinking a lot. Of course, when you don’t win the feeling that you were missing something remains, but a podium is a good result! Maybe other challenging races will arrive but the good thing for us is that so far in every race we have been in good shape.”
Valentino Rossi
“Yesterday, after the practice sessions, I saw that my rivals were a bit faster than I was. I was very close to the second group, but this morning we improved the settings with my team, together with Silvano, and then I had better turning and could go a bit faster. After that I wasn’t far off, but unfortunately just not close enough. Later Dovi made a mistake and I arrived on the podium. I’m happy because last year at this race track we struggled a lot – it was a disaster – while this year I was able to keep up the pace until the last lap, in a good way. These are also important points for the championship, because I’ve gained a small advantage to defend second place and we have to continue like this.”
The next race of the MotoGP World Championship will be in the Netherlands, in two weeks time, at the Assen circuit for the Dutch TT from 29th June to 1st July.
