| #QatarGP: The Ducati Lenovo Team secures fourth place with Francesco Bagnaia in the first Sprint of the season at Lusail, Enea Bastianini is sixth |
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- Jorge Martín wins the Qatari Sprint from pole, aboard the Desmosedici GP of team Pramac Racing
Francesco Bagnaia has finished fourth in the opening Sprint of the season, which took place at the Lusail International Circuit over an 11-lap distance. Enea Bastianini was fourth at the chequered flag.
The two factory Ducati rider had wrapped up qualifying in the top five, with Enea Bastianini able to put together an excellent last lap that granted him the third place on the grid, with Pecco fifth at the end of Q2. Both riders were seeded directly to the final qualifying session thanks to the positive work done in the atypical Practice session held today.
Both Pecco and Enea managed to keep their starting position as the race began, with the two-time reigning champion that made his way – in the first half of the encounter – up to third place, which he kept until the last lap.
Bagnaia then crossed the line in fourth place ahead of team Gresini Racing MotoGP’s Marc Màrquez, also on Ducati machinery. Third in the early stages of the race, Bastianini then lost touch with the group battling for the podium and was eventually sixth at the line.
The Sunday full race for the Qatar GP will get underway at 20:00 local time (GMT +3), with the warmup scheduled earlier on at 15:40.
Francesco Bagnaia (#1 Ducati Lenovo Team) – 4th
“Overall, it was a positive Sprint, as a fourth place represents a good number of points secured. Surely the feeling is different compared to testing, maybe because of track conditions. It’s true that if I started from the front row, or even from pole, things would have been very different, but unfortunately, I got the last two corners wrong during my quick-lap attempt. We need to work on the bike behaviour at the rear end; I struggled at the end, I could make the most of cornering and had to change my style a bit. We now have a clearer picture on where to improve ahead of tomorrow.”
Enea Bastianini (#23 Ducati Lenovo Team) – 6th
“It was a bit of an unusual race. I was expecting to do a little bit better, but I’m still quite happy. After four laps, I started experiencing a little bit of vibration and grip issues, especially in the faster parts of the track, which we’ll have to analyse and solve ahead of tomorrow when we’ll also need to manage the tyre wear as best as possible. The guys are working towards it and we’ll try to do better tomorrow.”
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