Repsol Honda Team rider claims fourth win at the Circuit of The Americas –his tenth on North American soil. A mistake for Dani Pedrosa takes him out of the fight for second place.
Marc Marquez returns to Europe with a successful haul from the MotoGP World Championship’s American leg, following up on his win last weekend in Argentina with a victory in the USA this Sunday. The Repsol Honda rider now has an amazing ten straight victories Stateside –eight in MotoGP, and two in Moto2. Starting from pole position, Marquez took the holeshot in the race and led from the first lap to the chequered flag. His teammate, Dani Pedrosa, was unable to make it two podiums from as many weekends, but was involved in the hunt for second place. After a good start, the Spaniard moved up into fifth on the first lap, fourth by Lap 3 and was situated behind Andrea Dovizioso and Jorge Lorenzo. However, chatter from the front end of his bike took him out of the race when braking at Turn 1 of Lap 6, also bringing down Dovizioso. With this result, Marquez tops the overall standings with 66 points and Pedrosa is fifth with 27.
Marc Marquez
“I’m very happy with how the whole weekend has gone. This is a circuit that I like, one of my favourite, but there were some unknowns here because just before the race we decided to run the soft front tyre. In the end the team advised me very well, because the change gave me the good feeling with the bike that I had partly lost in the warm-up. I have to thank them all, as well as the Michelin technician. When I asked, they told me that I would be okay for the first 12-15 laps, and then after that I would have to manage the situation more, which is exactly what happened. We’ve taken another victory here in Austin and are now on a run of four in a row, which is great. In addition, the joy of the team after we won illustrates everything we’re working on. In these first three races of the year, we’ve made good use of the situations that we’ve encountered.”
Dani Pedrosa
“It was a rather difficult weekend overall. The practice sessions didn’t go entirely well, but I approached the race with hope and I think we started quite well. I gained positions and was in a very good group, and I think we could have fought with Lorenzo for second place; the pace we had was much better than in practice. Unfortunately, I made a small mistake, losing the front end under braking when I was still turning into the corner. I lost control and tried to save the crash, but I ended up going down and taking Dovizioso with me. It’s a shame to have finished the race in that way, and I feel especially bad for Andrea and want to apologise to him. I’m glad he’s fine. The good news is that we took a big step forward from practice to the race. Now we must carefully look into the data we collected during the race and try to build on it for the Jerez GP in two weeks’ time.”
