One week after the Dutch TT at Assen, where Andrea Dovizioso took the lead of the premier-class championship thanks to a hard fought fifth place finish, the Ducati Team has now moved 650 km eastwards across Germany, for the ninth round of MotoGP™. At the half-way point of the season, the prize of taking the 2017 Championship becomes tangible indeed for the Italian rider.
This is now the first time since moving up to the MotoGP™ class in 2008 that Dovizioso has headed the championship standings – an effort the team can be proud of even considering the slim margin of only four points that stand between him and Movistar Yamaha rider Maverick Viñales.
Dovizioso has twice appeared on the MotoGP™ podium at the Sachsenring: in 2012, when he finished third, and 2016 when he again finished third at the end of a challenging race held in adverse weather. Ducati´s single victory in MotoGP™ at the German track was with Casey Stoner back in 2008, also in unfavourable conditions, and Dovisioso´s own third place podium last year was the first top three finish for the manufacturer since 2010.
Andrea Dovizioso: “The Sachsenring is a track that has created a few problems for us in the past, but it has just been resurfaced and so it will be new for everyone. As always we will have to take account of the behaviour of the tyres, especially in this case seeing as no one has been able to test on the new track surface. It gives me great satisfaction to arrive in Germany as leader of the championship, but it won’t change my way of racing because, even in the past, I’ve never raced for each individual result, always with one eye on the championship: we’ll try and do a good job here in Germany to get the best possible result in Sunday’s race.”