Crutchlow: It'll be a big battle

Fresh from a record-breaking Assen race, MotoGP could be set for another big battle at the Sachsenring.

Just over half-a-second covered the top twelve riders in qualifying and Cal Crutchlow believes at least ten of them will be fighting at the front on Sunday.

The Englishman, who will start the race in seventh position, thinks tyre choice will once again be crucial:

"I don’t know if anyone has done the full 30 laps on one tyre. We've done close, but if you do 20 there's still another 10 left when you could lose a second a lap or something.

"The problem is we can use both the soft and the medium rear. They are both really similar. The soft is faster for sure, but the medium maybe lasts longer. 

"The Ducati maybe has the most grip and if one of them has the soft I think it'll be difficult. I don’t think the tyre will drop for them as much as for everyone else, if they run the soft. They could probably keep it going.

"I think it'll be a big battle. Honestly, I think it’ll be a ten rider battle at least."

Crutchlow, who began the day with the third fastest lap time in FP3, felt he could have been one row higher on the grid had he not made a mistake.

"I was pissed off because I made a mistake myself," he said.

"I ran into Turn 8 really fast from Turn 7. I knew I was going good because of the rpm, so then I braked too early. Then I released the brake early, because I was going too slow. And then I ran onto the kerb on the exit and lost two tenths!

"With it being so close, two tenths would have put me on the second row and I'd have been a lot happier than the third row.

"But we're going better than yesterday. The bike is working well. But we’ll have to see what it's like for race distance tomorrow.

"We improved the setting a little bit. We tried something a little bit different at the front of the bike to decelerate. I'm struggling in the last sector on a fast lap. But on a normal race lap I'm not too bad.

"Also, when you're in a group - it's a lot harder because of the heat on the tyres - but you also get pulled along in the places where you are not the best. 

"We are good in sector two. Considering we really struggle with turning of our bike, we just find a way around it. Me, Marc, Dani - I think we've mastered riding around the turning problem we have."

How have you mastered it?

"Riding with the rear brake on!"

Crutchlow will start the final race before the summer break tied with Andrea Dovizioso for fifth in the world championship and just two points from satellite rival Johann Zarco, who qualified down in 14th.