Andrea Dovizioso admits he did not create a “positive strategy” for his battle for victory with Marc Marquez in the last laps of the MotoGP Thailand Grand Prix as he lead the Honda rider for too long.
Dovizioso seized the lead from Valentino Rossi on lap 11, with Marquez following the Ducati rider through on the Yamaha rider.
Marquez and Dovizioso engaged in a hard battle in the closing stages, which came down to the last corner, with the former prevailing by just 0.115s to secure the win.
Dovizioso admits his time leading Marquez stopped him from discovering his “positive and negative points”, and feels he could have had a better chance at making last-corner move stick had he elected against responding Marquez's pass on him at Turn 5 on the final lap.
“Unfortunately I didn't make a positive strategy because I didn't know the positive and negative points of Marc, because I was always in front of him,” Dovizioso, who is now 77 points adrift of Marquez in the standings, admitted.
“When he overtake me in Turn 5 I was trying to answer immediately, because I thought I didn't have any chance to answer until the last corner.
“That's why I try that, but didn't work because I lose time when I was trying [to retaliate at] Turn 6, and I realise in Turn 10 he was in trouble with the tyres, I didn't know.
“I was able to recover some metres, but not enough to be very close to stopping in the last brake. So to say I did a bad strategy is too much, but this is what happens.
“If I didn't try in Turn 5, I was able to try in a different way the last corner, with Marc you never know how will end.
“But I was too far to make a really good brake and stop him. Immediately when I start to brake I realise it was impossible for me to stop.
“I was hoping Marc would go long with me, but he was able to stop the bike better than me.”
Dovizioso feels Ducati made a “bigger step than Aragon” with set-up, and in particular tyre conservation, as what the Italian marque “understood” in this area at Aragon carried over.
“It was a bit better than what we expected, because yes, the speed was there with a good grip, but in this kind of race and in this kind of track where the consumption is very high – today it was even more than Aragon – in the past we couldn't even finish the race or try to make the podium or try to fight for the victory.
“So I think we did another big step, bigger than Aragon, and what we understood in Aragon it worked here and this is one of the reasons why we were fighting to the last corner with Marc, because we work in the right way across the weekend and my feeling improve with the set-up.
“But we work on some other things and it was good for the tyres, I was able to struggle to the end but not be in a completely different situation to Marc like what happen in some other races."
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