To be racing at home, to score a solid result and to have had fun out there is nice. I just want to say a huge ‘thank you’ to my whole team, to Ducati and to everybody who has continued to believe in me during some difficult times this season.

We have made progress over the last two races, we have kept the faith and it has paid off with this fifth place. Hopefully we can keep it going and score even better results as the season progresses.”

DNF:
Gabor Talmacsi HUN Scot Racing Team MotoGP
Loris Capirossi ITA Rizla Suzuki MotoGP
Andrea Dovizioso ITA Repsol Honda Team
Sete Gibernau SPA Grupo Francisco Hernando

DSQ:
James Toseland GBR Monster Yamaha Tech 3

The data guys did a good job and we made a good step with the mapping this morning that allowed me to come off the corners a lot better. I had a crash at the end of free practice that set us back a little bit but we got it together for qualifying this afternoon and at the end there it looked like I might steal P6, which I would have been real happy with. We slipped back to eighth but considering that we usually lose positions from free practice to qualifying, to make some up today is pleasing.

It got pretty gnarly at the end of the session there, a lot of guys were crashing and there were yellow flags everywhere. People thought getting rid of qualifying tyres would make things safer but when grid positions are as important as they are at a circuit like this you’re going to have guys hanging it out for a fast lap on a race tyre, and that ain’t so safe! I don’t remember a dry qualifying session with so much carnage at the end and it’s something we need to look at.”

In some places the bike feels quite good but in other places, coming out of the corners, it feels pretty flat and I don’t have enough acceleration. Usually this is a strong point of the Ducati so it’s a little strange so we’ll have a look at the mapping and see if we can figure out the problem tonight. Normally around here you have a lot of wheelies and I don’t have any so it’s obviously something we need to put right.

I’ve got a new helmet design here for the 4th July. It is tradition to let off fireworks here so that is the basis of the design, although on the track we haven’t let anything go yet! Hopefully we can get a better direction with the engine tomorrow and find some spark!”

I got a great start and was able to lead the second group for a while until a couple of guys came past and I lost my rhythm a bit. I made a little mistake under braking on the back straight, ran wide and lost a lot of time but I fought back and got in with the group again. I was having great fun but unfortunately the left handlebar came kind of loose about halfway through the race and cost me a lot of time – that’s when a lot of the guys got past me.

I know I’m coming out with a lot of excuses this year but a loose handlebar at that speed is pretty scary! The guys are looking at how it happened. Anyway, man it was a hard battle. I know we were only fighting for fifth or sixth but it felt like there was a title on the line out there!

Big respect to everybody in the group though. Elias made a big mistake but everybody left it all out on the track today and we all shook hands afterwards. It was good to be a part of the battle.”

DNF:
Dani Pedrosa SPA Repsol Honda Team
Andrea Dovizioso ITA Repsol Honda Team
Mika Kallio FIN Pramac Racing

The cooler track today made it hard to get heat into the left-hand side of the tyre. You don’t get good balance with the single compound tyres around here, for me at least, the right side is really good but it’s hard to get heat into the left. We’ll see what the weather brings, obviously we could do with it being nice and hot, line up and see what we got!”