Alvaro Bautista on near misses: ‘I saved some slides with my elbow’

After qualifying down in 11th place, Alvaro Bautista was then dropped to P14 ahead of the race after being given a three-place grid penalty for ‘slow riding’ in qualifying.

The two-time WorldSBK champion was quiet in the opening stages before finding his rhythm which led to him seething his way through the second group. 

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Once Bautista overtook Danilo Petrucci and Michael Van Der Mark, the Spaniard quickly latched onto the rear of Andrea Iannone before taking P3 away from the GoEleven rider.

“It’s never easy, especially because this track is so complicated to push from the beginning<” said Bautista post-race.

“You have to manage the tyres. I was in the situation that I wanted to push more in the first laps to gain some positions but, at the same time, I had to save the tyres.

“I tried to keep calm, to manage the tyre as well as possible. Behind the other riders, the big group, I had some problems with the front as it overheated.

“I didn’t have good turning and I had to save some slides with my elbow; fortunately, I could save everything.

“At the mid-race point, many riders were coming to me, and I think third was the maximum I could do.”

Bautista said the biggest challenge when following other riders was not being able to do ‘the lines I wanted’.

On several occasions it appeared as though Bautista was losing front grip when following riders ahead of him.

However, quick overtakes followed on most of the riders around him which gave him the chance to secure a double podium for the factory Ducati team.

Bautista added: “When you are behind the other riders, the front tyre doesn’t work as expected and I struggled to brake hard or enter fast into corners.

“I lost it many times behind other riders because I can’t do the lines I wanted to.

“I spent some time behind him, but I don’t think that if I passed him quicker, I could’ve got to second place.

“I think our best was to get a podium, but this was a surprise for me.”