Dovizioso shows great form on first day of free practice for TIM San Marino and Rimini Riviera GP
with the fastest time in the wet.
Crutchlow in eleventh place.

Andrea Dovizioso produced a great run in today’s free practice sessions at the Misano World Circuit, where the TIM San Marino and Rimini Riviera GP, round 13 of the MotoGP World Championship, is being held. The Italian rider powered his Desmosedici GP14 to the top of the overnight leaderboard after the first two free practice sessions. Despite a crash on his out-lap in the afternoon session, Dovi then went on to set the quickest time of the day – 1’49.195 – in conditions made more difficult by heavy rain.

Due to a technical problem in the second session, for the moment his team-mate Cal Crutchlow remains outside the top 10 in the standings.

Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team #04) – 1st (1’49.195)

“Of course I am very happy because it’s always a pleasure to set the quickest time! It was a pity about the crash at the start of this afternoon’s session, but we did manage to understand the reason why and then thanks to the modifications we made for the final run, we made a big step forward and this allowed me to regain feeling in the bike and set the fastest time at the end of the session. We have good pace, also in the wet, and I think that we will manage to be quite quick in the dry, seeing as we did a test here less than one month ago.”

Cal Crutchlow (Ducati Team #35) – 11th (1’51.757)

“We had some technical problems in the afternoon session, so I am disappointed with the position. I’m sure that our potential is obviously a lot better than what we’ve shown so far, and that’s a positive from today, because I felt quite comfortable and confident in the rain conditions. I used the harder front tyre in the morning and crashed: it was a strange session, and the track is obviously really slick in the rain but I’m fine with no injury.”

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