The Ducati Lenovo Team made it to the lowest step of the podium today courtesy of Francesco Bagnaia, who was third at the line in the 15-lap sprint race at the Sachsenring. Enea Bastianini put together a good comeback from the third row of the grid as he stayed in the podium battle up to the final lap.
Bagnaia had the perfect start from fourth place and took the race lead at turn one. The reigning world champion maintained the position up until lap four, when he was overtaken by Martín at turn eight, with Oliveira taking advantage of the move to take second place. Pecco tried to stay attached to his rivals as he struggled a bit with the front-end grip of his Desmosedici GP machine, eventually finishing third.
Bastianini had a solid performance overall as he made the most of the good race pace shown in the previous day. From ninth place on the grid, Enea made his way back to fourth and then bridged the gap with the frontrunners; he was unable, however, to get the better of his teammate for a spot on the podium.
With the #GermanGP sprint race completed, Bagnaia is now 15 points away from the current championship leader Martín in second place, while Bastianini is fourth and 70 points in arrears, but only 4 points behind third-placed rider Marc Márquez. The ninth full race of the season will get underway tomorrow from 14:00 local time (GMT +2).
Francesco Bagnaia (#1 Ducati Lenovo Team) – 3rd
“We had a great start, then when I saw that Oliveira was about to make a move on Martín, I knew they would have both gone wide, so I dove in. I was doing a good job, but maybe I chose to save the rear tyre a bit too much in order to be in the best condition at the end of the race; I believe Jorge understood that and he took the opportunity to overtake me, also because I think it that one or two laps later it would have been a lot harder for him to do so. The fact that I didn’t exploit the tyre more was my mistake, as the drop in terms of grip happened to everyone. At some point in the race, overtaking is a lot more difficult due to the front tyre pressure. I tried to regain my position as soon as possible, but the front tyre had already become difficult to manage.”
Enea Bastianini (#23 Ducati Lenovo Team) – 4th
“I felt good at the beginning of the race, then there was a big drop of grip at the front and that’s when the struggles began. The same happened to the others so I thought about attacking, but once I bridged the gap to Pecco I didn’t have much left in the tank. Each time I got close to him I had to step back a little and it was this way for more or less the whole race. I’m a little disappointed about it because it’s another fourth place in a sprint race, but that’s how it went. Surely a better starting position would have help, but I must say this morning I was still a bit in pain, and it took me a little to get up to speed. Tomorrow’s race will be 30 laps long and the temperatures should be lower compared today, so I hope this will serve us well for a better race.”
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