Dovizioso “scared” over Marquez final-corner fight for victory

Andrea Dovizioso says he never intended to take his battle for victory at the Austrian MotoGP down to the final corner and conceded it was an all-or-nothing attack against Marc Marquez.

In a repeat of the pair’s fight for the win at the Red Bull Ring from 2017, it was a case of roles reversed with Dovizioso chasing Marquez into the final corner.

While on that occasion Marquez failed to pull off his late overtake, with Dovizioso using the power of his Ducati to sprint back ahead at the finish line, the Italian rider was able to halt his momentum enough to stay on track and keep ahead of his MotoGP title rival.

Despite the frantic and emotional end to his race, breaking a nine-race winless run, Dovizioso says he was worried the last-corner pass wouldn’t pay off and felt the Repsol Honda rider’s overall race pace remained to strong to beat.

“I was a bit scared about that. During the race I didn’t have that good feeling,” Dovizioso said about his late overtake. “I was there but we were pushing, not every lap but we were pushing and on braking we tried to save the tyre a little bit but we were on the limit and when you are behind a rider here it is a bit harder.

“I really didn’t prepare that corner and it was not a corner for my style or my bike to enter there, but it happened along with a lot of things during the race.

“If you are pushing 100% it is a bit harder so you have to be really careful on the braking and you don’t want to brake too late because then you can make a mistake easily.

“I wasn’t as fast as Marc but I had more grip to stay with them. I am so happy for many reasons. I think it is the best or one of the best victories because we didn’t have the same speed as Marc before the race so we needed a strategy to try to stay with him.”

While Dovizioso feels Ducati still has plenty of work ahead to develop the GP19, with particular focus on turning and corner speed, the Italian rider wants the victory to act as fresh motivation and galvanise his team after a tough run of results.

“In the end I had a chance to fight until the end and the last corner because he didn’t have the same grip as me on the right. On the braking it was better but with that grip I was able to stay with him and make that crazy last corner,” he added.

“I really didn’t prepare that but I did Turn 9 in a perfect way, the corner before, so I was a bit on the inside and I thought okay if I am going long I will be second no problem but I stopped the bike in the right way.

“I am so happy, so happy for Ducati because we needed that, this victory and in this way, it will give us energy for the future which is what we need.”

Dovizioso has trimmed Marquez’s MotoGP world championship lead to 58 points with eight rounds to go in the 2019 campaign.