Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team) was on provisional pole at Misano until the final few minutes, but the Championship leader just lost out to Maverick Viñales (Movistar Yamaha MotoGP) and will instead start second – not a result he expected. Not feeling quite 100% happy on the bike until heading out for Q2 on a new tyre, ‘DesmoDovi’ had his projections as the front two rows, and so is more than happy to be launching off the line from second.
Tomorrow could be different weather, however, and Dovizioso thinks the key to victory will lie not in Saturday’s practice pace but in adaptation on Sunday – and thinks he can fight for it on home turf.
Andrea Dovizioso, P2: “It’s always nice to get pole but it wasn’t what I was looking for. I’m surprised to take second, before qualifying I didn’t feel really good but when I started with a new tyre for qualifying I felt good again and I thought we could make a good time. My goal was first two rows so even better. I’m happy about that. They have good pace but we can fight. Conditions for sure will be different to today and everyone will have to adapt. On this track I think the new fairing works well and I think we can be fast with both, but I think I’m quite good now to use the best potential of the standard fairing and we decided to work with that. I followed a Ducati with the new fairing and in some places they’re faster, but I’m faster in other places. We’ll decide day by day and race by race. I think we made the right decision and this confirms it. It’s difficult to know how competitive everyone will be tomorrow because we have different approaches to practice, but I think it will be who is more ready for the new conditions rather than the pace today. Everybody is trying to not make mistakes, that’s the key to this Championship, but we have to try the maximum.”