Andrea Dovizioso believes the changes Ducati made to his GP18 during the Czech Grand Prix weekend will positively “affect” him in the remaining MotoGP races.
Dovizioso took his first pole position since the 2016 Malaysian Grand Prix in Brno, and converted that to his first victory since the opening round in Qatar following a late battle with Ducati teammate Jorge Lorenzo.
The Italian was highlighted by points leader Marc Marquez as the main threat for Sunday's 21-lap race, and Dovizioso claims he was able to “play” with the bike “in a better way” in Brno than at any other race this year.
“I think if you study every weekend, you can see easy our bike is better than last year,” Dovizioso, who moves into third in the standings and 68 points from Marquez, said.
“The point is, we did three zero [point scores], and in the championship it's very bad.
“But in all these three races [in which I didn't finish] we were fighting for the podium. We lose a lot of points.
“But I think and I believe what we changed during the weekend will affect a little bit the second part of the championship.
“I was feeling better, I was able to play with the bike in a better way. I'm not happy 100 percent, I think still we have to manage the tyre in a better way, but overall our bike is really good.”
Dovizioso led for much of the 21-lap encounter, heading a group which at one stage extended back to 11th.
Expecting a fight in the closing stages, Dovizioso admits he attempted to run a “strange” pace in a bid to thin out the lead group, but as unsuccessful in his efforts.
“At the beginning I was trying to make something strange, to understand because the group was big at the beginning.
“It's always better to have less riders [in a group] when you start to fight, especially when you have to manage the tyre.
“But it didn't work, because the group stay six until five laps to the end. But when you are leading, you are able to try some strategy, don't push too much to make a mistake.”
