Successful end to busy weekend for Andrea Dovizioso

Repsol Honda’s Andrea Dovizioso had an eventful time at his home Grand Prix, which ended with him moving up to fifth place in the championship.

The Gran Premio Cinzano di San Marino e della Riviera di Rimini was an important weekend for Andrea Dovizioso, with the highly gifted young Italian being confirmed as a Repsol Honda rider for 2010 before Sunday’s race - in front of a passionate Italian crowd.

Dovizioso’s hometown of Forli is a one hour drive (75km) drive from the Misano circuit and he had plenty of friends and family members looking on from the stands as he successfully battled with another popular Italian in the final stages, eventually outpacing the veteran Suzuki rider on the final lap to take fourth place by two-tenths of a second.

Dovizioso had worked diligently over the course of the weekend to incorporate his new Ohlins suspension system onto the factory RC212V, meaning that he appeared not to be riding at 100% until the race itself, having qualified down in eighth place.

Dovizioso seems to be a specialist a finishing fourth, having now done so on six occasions this year, thrice in the last three races, but this time the result was enough to lift him above crasher Colin Edwards in the standings into fifth position overall.

Summarising his home GP, Dovizioso stated, “I’m reasonably happy with this weekend. This was the first time with Ohlins and of course we couldn’t have the perfect set-up but this is just the start and I’m very confident for the future. I’m happy too because I renewed my contract with Honda. This is my first year in the factory Honda team and I feel that I still haven’t shown my full potential. I know the machine better now and we are working together in preparation for next year.”

Describing his race, he commented, I pushed 100 per cent in the first laps. I had a good feeling with the bike but unfortunately on lap seven I made a mistake at turn 11 and I lost contact with the front riders. This mistake compromised the race as after that I couldn’t stay with the leaders. In the last laps I had quite a battle with Capirossi for fourth place. He was braking very hard but in the end I passed him and closed every gap so that he couldn’t get past again.