Dovizioso’s secret to beating Márquez in MotoGP

Andrea Dovizioso announced his retirement last week, after two decades in the grand prix paddock. The Italian had his greatest years after MotoGP switched to Michelin tyres, when he became famous for his last-corner defeats of Marc Márquez. So how did he do it?

By

display_61b60c3443

Red Bull Ring 2017: Dovizioso suckers Márquez into out-braking him at the last turn, Márquez runs wide and Dovizioso cuts back inside to win

Red Bull Ring 2017: Dovizioso suckers Márquez into out-braking him at the last turn, Márquez runs wide and Dovizioso cuts back inside to win

Ducati

Between the start of MotoGP’s Michelin era in 2016 and the first race of 2020, where Marc Márquez got hurt, the rider that beat the six-times MotoGP king most frequently was Andrea Dovizioso.

Which is quite a feat, if you consider Márquez to be the most talented motorcycle racer of all time.

Dovizioso has never been considered the fastest rider on the grid, so how did he inflict so many defeats on Márquez and in such spectacular fashion?

By thinking hard and coming up with a plan.

Obviously Dovizioso and Márquez are very different riders. Dovizioso pretty much always rides within himself, working with the laws of physics, while Márquez seems to subvert those laws and happily rides outside the limits that seem to constrain even multiple world champions.

Japanese-Ducati-team-celebrates-winning-2017-Japanese-GP

Ducati celebrate Dovizioso’s cut-back victory over Márquez at rain-lashed Motegi in 2017. It was his fifth win for Ducati

Ducati

Dovizioso is most famous for the five last-corner defeats he inflicted on Márquez, at Red Bull Ring in 2017 and 2019, at Losail in 2018 and 2019 and at Motegi in 2017. All but one of these was achieved in the same way, by cutting back inside the Honda rider and beating him to the chequered flag. On each occasion Dovizioso won the race by two tenths of a second or less – they were some of the greatest duels of the MotoGP era.

When Márquez first arrived in MotoGP it was immediately obvious that he was unique. He won his second race in the category at COTA in April 2013 and two weeks later at Jerez he battled with reigning champion Jorge Lorenzo for second place.

Related article

Lorenzo led into the final hairpin, where Márquez divebombed him, just like Valentino Rossi on Sete Gibernau in 2005 and Mick Doohan on Alex Crivillé in 1996.

Lorenzo’s reaction to Márquez charging up the inside was the normal reaction: he turned into the corner, hoping to close down the youngster. Instead the pair collided, just like Rossi and Gibernau. Inevitably in these circumstances the rider on the inside comes out best, while the rider on the outside gets pushed out wide.

Dovizioso had a better plan. Each of his five final-turn defeats of Márquez were based upon what he learned during his three years in the 250 class from 2004 to 2007, when he rode a Honda RS250RW

“Because of that bike and the way we worked during that time I became a very late, hard braker,” says the 36-year-old. “The bike gave me the possibility to do that, so from that I really learned to manage the brakes and from that came my riding style.”

In 2013 Dovizioso joined Ducati, riding the not-so-great Desmosedici, which even then had great braking stability, so he became one of the latest brakers in MotoGP. That, plus the strategy and situations he created allow him to do what no one else could really do: beat Márquez in a final-corner showdown.

Ducati-rider-Andrea-Dovizioso-overtakes-Honda-rider-Marc-Marquez-at-the-2019-Qatar-GP-held-at-Losail

Dovizioso wins the 2019 Qatar GP by 0.023sec, thanks to another final-corner cut-back move on Márquez

Ducati

“Marc and I are opposite in a lot of ways and I think in a completely different way to him and that’s the reason I was able to beat him more than once,” he adds. “I understood him and I knew what he could do, so I tried to create situations, thinking about how he would react to those situations. That was the only way to beat him and it worked.”

Each of the four occasions Dovizioso beat Márquez with the cutback were identical. Dovizioso led into the last corner and Márquez attacked on the inside. Unlike Lorenzo, Dovizioso didn’t try to close him down but instead let him through, because he knew what would happen next. In other words, he suckered him into defeat.

“I knew I couldn’t fight with a more aggressive rider, so I had to avoid that situation and the only way to beat him was to create the other situation. Every time I did the cut-back it was a good manoeuvre but it wasn’t the crucial move, because that happened before.

“I could do the cut-back because I created a small gap during braking. I braked so late, but I knew I could stop the bike and I knew that Marc would try 100% to pass me and I knew that because of the situation I had created by braking so late he wouldn’t be able to stop his bike. That was my approach.

“But it wasn’t easy to manage, because I had to wait and try to understand if he was really there because I couldn’t see him, so I didn’t have everything under control but I had to try.

“All these four victories happened because it’s almost impossible to brake after me, so if you try to brake after me you will go wide and I’ll be ready to cut back underneath you.”

The only time Dovizioso didn’t beat Márquez with an undercut was at Red Bull Ring in 2019, when Márquez led towards the final corner and Dovizioso came past on the brakes. That was the victory that nearly gave Ducati team manager Davide Tardozzi a heart attack.

Ducati-rider-Andrea-Dovizioso-overtakes-Honda-rider-Marc-Marquez-at-the-2019-Austrian-GP-held-at-the-Red-Bull-Ring

Red Bull Ring 2019, the only time Dovizioso won a final-corner duel with Márquez without the cutback. Note Márquez’s broken front-brake guard flying above the pair

Ducati

By then Dovizioso’s career was nearly done. The arrival of Michelin’s softer, grippier 2020 slick undid the former 125cc world champion who had turned the Desmosedici by skidding into corners and spinning out of them. The extra grip of the new rear didn’t allow Dovizioso to ride like that and he struggled to adapt.

Ducati didn’t re-sign him for 2021 and he looked set to drift into retirement, until a seat became vacant at RNF Yamaha, as a knock-on effect of Maverick Viñales leaving the Japanese factory. Dovizioso returned to the grid at Misano in September aboard an RNF YZR-M1, not that dissimilar to the M1 he had ridden for Tech 3 Yamaha in 2012.

He has struggled woefully on the M1, failing to get inside the top ten even once. The problem is a lack of grip, he says, which Yamaha’s reigning champion and current points leader Fabio Quartararo rides around with his very special riding technique.

Dovizioso will ride his 348th and last grand prix at Misano next month. MotoGP will miss him, just as it’s missed those unforgettable Dovizioso/Márquez battles in recent seasons.

Comments

Loading Comments