Alvaro Bautista takes a hard fought ninth place at Brno

Andrea Dovizioso started the second half of the MotoGP season with a victory that brings him back into the fight for the World Championship. The Italian completed a Ducati double along with teammate Jorge Lorenzo at the Czech Grand Prix, taking the factory to second in the standings.

Marc Márquez remains the leader of the Rider World Championship and extended his lead over Valentino Rossi, after finishing third today ahead of the Italian. Márquez was involved in a final battle amongst the podium finishers along with Ducati duo, but was held off despite countless attempts to overtake.

Álvaro Bautista took a valuable ninth position in the Czech Grand Prix, in a race in which he never gave up. The Spaniard was eleventh at the start of the second half of the race, but was several seconds ahead of those behind him.

He managed to impose a strong pace, clocking the fastest lap of the race at that point (1:56.772) to cut the gap to the group fighting for eighth. On the final three laps he managed to overtake two rivals to get back into the Top 10, placing ninth.

9th Álvaro Bautista:
“It was a race of two halves: In the first I had the worst feeling that I’ve had in recent races, but in the second half there was a radical change and I set the fastest lap of the race until the three riders on the podium bested it late on. The strange thing about today was the start: I got off the line well but I was not able to stop the bike, and I almost crashed three or four times. I wasn’t comfortable, and I thought we had lost the race because it was impossible to ride. However, in the second half I managed to go fast and I was able to fight for the Top 8, but I was only able to overtake two of the three riders in the group; I needed one more lap to overtake Pedrosa. I’m happy with the second part of the race, but we have to analyse the first half, because we could have done just as well as in Germany and fight for the Top 5.”