Lorenzo likes new Ducati chassis, can fight at every race?

The last official in-season MotoGP test of the year provided Jorge Lorenzo with the chance to give the latest Ducati chassis a thorough evaluation.

The frame, thought to be the third Lorenzo has used since the start of this season, is distinguishable by some carbon fibre reinforcement.

Lorenzo likes new Ducati chassis, can fight at every race?

The last official in-season MotoGP test of the year provided Jorge Lorenzo with the chance to give the latest Ducati chassis a thorough evaluation.

The frame, thought to be the third Lorenzo has used since the start of this season, is distinguishable by some carbon fibre reinforcement.

Both Lorenzo and team-mate Andrea Dovizioso got one of the designs at Assen, but Lorenzo chose to put his aside until now.

"Finally today we have the time and possibility to try in a calm way the chassis that Dovi is using from Assen," Lorenzo said. "In Assen we tried but we have some problems so we decided to concentrate on the standard one and then here was the perfect day and perfect location to try it.

"In general I like it, but I think one track is not enough to decide which chassis we are going to use until the end the season. So we are going to try to reconfirm on Friday in Austria. Put one standard and one new chassis and see what happens.

"Here I prefer the new one. In general the positive things overcome the negative. But we have to reconfirm in Austria."

But when pressed on what exactly he liked about the new chassis, Lorenzo replied: "I cannot tell you anything!"

As Lorenzo indicated, Sunday's race winner Dovizioso has been running both chassis in recent events and tried each of them again on Monday.

Unlike Lorenzo, Dovizioso - who won with the new chassis - concluded that he will now use the "previous one, the old one", but emphasised the difference between them is "very small".

"Like always, positive and negative. But if you saw my bike in the last five laps yesterday, it was moving a lot. And the other [previous] chassis was more stable. And today we confirmed that, so this is good for us."

Both Ducati riders topped the timesheets during the eight-hours of testing action, eventually finishing fourth (Dovizioso) and fifth (Lorenzo), within 0.4s of Marc Marquez's best time.

With two factory Ducatis beating Marquez in a head-to-head victory showdown for the first time, does Lorenzo think the GP18 can now take on the Honda rider at every race?

"In Sachsenring we couldn't fight. Even if I thought we were closer finally the race demonstrated the truth, that still at the Sachsenring the Honda is superior. I guess we'll find some other tracks like that, probably Phillip Island," Lorenzo replied.

"But I hope even at Phillip Island to be much closer than last year. And apart from Phillip Island, I think in normal conditions we can fight… We've improved in the braking area compared to the Honda, as you could see this weekend."

Despite the new parts, Lorenzo feels his growing experience of the bike is the biggest factor.

"More than anything it's just the experience with this bike. Much more than last year and I understand many things that last year I didn't understand. The way to ride the bike, to consume less energy from the tyres and also physically.

"As I demonstrated yesterday we are prepared to attack also at the end of the race and to fight for the win also with another strategy."

Meanwhile, Dovizioso was beaming as he reflected on yesterday's win.

"It was a really important race. I really loved the race from yesterday, for many reasons. From the start to the end I was fighting with three riders, and at the end we won. And we are speaking about Valentino, Marc, and Jorge. And this is something," he said.

"When I think about that, it's good. It's the reality. Yes, it was really nice, and to have this victory in Brno is something very important for us.

"I think we did a good step during this weekend about my riding style with the bike, a lot. This is one point, the second point is we understood something and that I think will help to manage at every track.

"But in my opinion, we are still not 100% with the rear tyre, we are still missing something with the rear tyre. We can be better."

Unfortunately for the Ducati riders, they are a distant 68 (Dovizioso) and 76 (Lorenzo) points from Marquez, with nine rounds to go.

Lorenzo will move to Honda alongside Marquez next season, with Danilo Petrucci becoming team-mate to Dovizioso

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