Cal Crutchlow finished the Gran Premio TIM di San Marino e della Riviera di Rimini in eighth place after a hard fought battle under the searing Italian sun.
After starting from the third row of the grid in seventh, the Briton spent much of the race in the same position scrapping with the factory Ducati of Michele Pirro. Having lost out to the Italian right at the end of the race, Crutchlow was initially dealt a further blow when he was given a 1.5s penalty, which relegated him to ninth.
The decision came after FIM MotoGP Stewards saw that Crutchlow, who was suffering with visor problems, had exceeded the track limits at turn one on five occasions.
However, subsequently Timekeeping advised the Stewards of differences in the sector times which were not evident at the time the penalty was made. The Stewards were then able to establish that Crutchlow had deliberately slowed through the second sector of the track in order to give back the time gained. As a result, it was decided that the initial penalty would be revoked, and Crutchlow was reinstated back to eighth place.
With another eight points added to his account, Crutchlow remains in eighth place in the MotoGP™ World Championship.
Cal Crutchlow: “I think I did the best job possible and we worked well together as a team all weekend to be competitive. In the race I had some problems with the visor in my helmet because drips of sweat got onto it on about lap eight and it affected my vision for the last 20 laps. There was also a bit of a struggle with the front tyre which was really difficult to ride with here and didn’t suit the setting or my style. I gave my best as always and could easily have been a different result if things had gone for us.
“I ran off the track five times into turn one due to the visor problem, and gained an advantage three laps out of the five. Then I deliberately gave the time back in the second sector, actually even more than I gained. After the race we got the penalty, which was then overturned once we provided Race Direction with the data and the sector times to clarify that I deliberately gave the time back on each occasion.
“We’re not so happy with the result, but I think it was good to finish the race and get some more miles under our belts and now we look forward to going strong in Aragon.”