Andrea Dovizioso on the other hand will have to start round 4 of the championship from row 3. The Italian placed eleventh in the morning’s FP3 session and then topped the timesheets in Q1. In Q2 he set a time of 1’38.029, just a whisker away from his team-mate, but had to settle for eighth place on the grid.
Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team #04) – 8th (1’38.029)
“It’s a pity about the third row, but I’m very happy with the work of the guys in the team. We were in a bit of difficulty this morning but we were able to make the right decisions and improve the bike once again. Now we have good pace and can even think about fighting for the podium. It’s not easy to interpret the pace of our rivals because we don’t know who will use the hard or the medium tyres in the race, and not many riders have done comparative tests. In qualifying I went well but unfortunately I didn’t do a perfect lap and I will have to start in eighth place: however now we’ve resolved the situation with our pace, I reckon we can have a say in the outcome of tomorrow’s race.”