Luca Marini admitted that he felt a maiden MotoGP win could be on after seeing Francesco Bagnaia crash out in the Americas Grand Prix.
The VR46 Ducati racer showed impressive speed across the weekend at the Circuit of the Americas, the Italian securing a front row starting spot for both the sprint race as well as Sunday’s GP.
A tricky start in the sprint that saw him roughed up in the opening corners meant he could only take the chequered flag in seventh, though a much better getaway saw him challenging for the rostrum positions early on in the Americas GP.
Crashes for KTM’s Jack Miller and Bagnaia as the race approached half-distance moved him into third, before second became his after blasting past Yamaha’s Fabio Quartararo – Marini then setting his sights on the race-leading Honda of Alex Rins.
He ultimately lacked the ultimate pace to chase down the LCR rider though and eventually crossed the line second to secure a debut full-length MotoGP race rostrum result, though confirmed afterwards that he felt “victory was possible” having known it “could be a very good day” following his strong race runs throughout practice.
“This is fantastic, I knew that we it could be a very good day for me because I was very strong at this track, I’ve felt good since FP1 and myself and the team prepared the weekend very well,” explained Marini to BT Sport.
“I knew that after the mistake at the start of the sprint race that I needed to stay calm and wait during the first laps, Jack (Miller) and Fabio (Quartararo) were smart and overtook me and pushed quite a lot at the beginning, but I knew I was faster than them and tried to manage the tyres and slowly increase my pace.
“When Pecco (Bagnaia) crashed I thought the victory was possible so I tried to overtake Fabio quickly and catch Alex (Rins), but at the beginning of the race he made a big gap and it was impossible to recover it so in the final three laps I just managed things to the end.”
Marini added that it was a “shock” to him to see the amount of riders that crashed out of the encounter – with ten of the 22 pilots suffering spills at some point during the GP – due to him not feeling the conditions were particularly “demanding.”
“It was a shock to see how many riders crashed out or retired, for me it wasn’t so demanding, I felt today was a bit colder and easier and the bike felt really good,” continued Marini.
“My physical condition is also perfect, even though I tried to make a mess yesterday morning with the very high-speed crash, so everything was fine.
“I knew that this season could be one of our best because the bike is really strong, the package is there and the team is doing is doing a great job with a lot of great people, so I hope we can continue like this for the rest of the year and fight for another victory as soon as possible.”
Keyword: Marini: ‘I thought victory was possible’