Lorenzo: “The bike wasn’t ready”

Lost time in the pits costly for the five-time World Champion

Jorge Lorenzo (Ducati Team) made a stunner of a start in the Czech GP, pulling away in the lead in tricky damp conditions. Pitting from second soon after, the ‘Spartan’ then lost some time in the pit lane swapping bikes – and re-emerged much further down the order. Fighting back through into the points and bridging some big gaps, Lorenzo crossed the line in P15 – but there’s optimism for the next race in Austria, where Ducati won last year.

Jorge Lorenzo, P15: “Today’s race was a real shame. The weather was so unpredictable and it stopped raining when I was really fast on the damp track. I felt pretty good and I think we could have been able to fight for the win if the conditions had remained the same. Then we made an error with the bike change, because when the team signalled to me to return to the pits the bike wasn’t ready and we lost a bit of time, which ruined the rest of my race. For sure we’ll learn from this negative experience and won’t repeat the same error, but the positive thing from this weekend is that we were always competitive, both in the wet and the dry. Now we’re going to a circuit where we should be amongst the favourites, so we’ll do everything possible to demonstrate it in the race.”