Ducati's Andrea Dovizioso says he “didn't expect” to claim a front row start for the MotoGP Qatar Grand Prix after finishing testing with a “very bad feeling”.
Dovizioso ended the Qatar test in a low-key 14th on his works Ducati, and admits the “speed wasn't there” coming into the first race weekend of the 2019 season.
The 2018 Qatar race winner managed to place his GP19 second on the grid, missing pole by just 0.198 seconds, though admits he is still unsure what Ducati can do in Sunday's 22-lap race.
“I'm so happy in the way we worked during practice, because we improve a lot our speed,” he said.
“That's what you need to try to save the tyre and to be on top in the race because there are a lot of fast riders. But to be fast and save the tyres is a different story.
“I don't know what we can really do, but the speed is there. At the end of the practice we showed that.
“But Maverick [Vinales], Marc [Marquez] and not only them have a really good speed. But we can't know really who will be in a better shape in the last 10 laps.
“I don't know what we can expect from the race, but I'm so happy for the first row, I didn't expect to have that speed and I'm happy in the work we did, and I'm happy in the way I prepared the weekend because the speed wasn't there.”
Dovizioso says Ducati “didn't work in the right way” during the Qatar test, which he put down to the “strange” characteristics of the Losail circuit, but felt the negative experience still proved useful in allowing them to make a "big" change.
“We tried to improve in the areas where we have to be better,” he added.
“In this track it didn’t work, I think the characteristics of this track are quite strange.
“Also it’s not the best track to make a lot of test, because every day is a different story: humidity, wind, sand. It’s very difficult.
“The three days we did the test, we didn’t work in the right way, but the experience is always good – good and negative.
“It was important to analyse, study and understand the way for this weekend, the right way. But after you have to put it on the track and that is very difficult, especially in the race weekend to change something big is difficult.
“But we worked in a relaxed way, that was the key, and step by step – even if the condition was different yesterday to today, and conditions weren’t the best for us today with the wind – we showed a really good speed."
