Marquez: I had more pace but Austin was in my head

Marc Marquez says he could have secured a 10th consecutive Sachsenring victory by an even greater margin but was wary of pushing unnecessarily hard and suffering the same fate as he did at the Americas MotoGP earlier this year.

Marquez: I had more pace but Austin was in my head

Marc Marquez says he could have secured a 10th consecutive Sachsenring victory by an even greater margin but was wary of pushing unnecessarily hard and suffering the same fate as he did at the Americas MotoGP earlier this year.

The Repsol Honda rider dominated to a 10th straight pole position and win in Germany by leading every lap to clinch victory by 4.5 seconds over Maverick Vinales. Marquez also produced a new lap record at Sachsenring to complete the perfect weekend as he extends his MotoGP world championship lead going into the summer break to 58 points on nearest challenger Andrea Dovizioso.

Having notched up lap record pace, Marquez admits he could have gone even faster but opted to conserve a manageable time gap to the chasing pack in order to minimise his own risks.

Earlier this year Marquez crashed out while comfortably leading the Americas MotoGP round in Austin having continued pushing to open up a dominant gap at the front.

“I pushed more or less for 10 laps, then I tried to save the tyres for 10 more laps, and then the last 10 laps it is true that I had more [pace] but in the end Austin was in my head,” Marquez said. “I knew it didn’t matter as I needed three or four seconds of an advantage and then I tried to manage that.

“I didn’t want to increase the advantage so I managed it. I feel really good with the bike and I took that profit.

“The good thing is when we struggle we are still there as we have that small advantage and when we feel good we can win the race in this way.”

Having pulled off his pre-race strategy without any trouble, Marquez says his only headache was opting for the medium rear Michelin tyre having anticipated the hard rear being the best pick for the race.

But following overnight rain and cooler track temperatures on Sunday compared to the rest of the weekend, Marquez felt the medium rear tyre was the right one as he could manage the tyre life in the colder conditions.

“I was convinced about taking the hard rear but then after warm-up and on the grid we picked the medium and that was the correct choice as I felt good from the beginning until the end so I am very happy,” he said.

“My plan was to lead the race from the beginning until the end, try to just warm the tyres for the first two laps and then push in the third lap and that is exactly what I did as planned. That’s exactly what we spoke about with the team. We did a great job and the Repsol Honda team worked in a good way.”

Marquez has matched Valentino Rossi’s all-time record of 10 wins at one circuit, which the Italian has achieved at Mugello, and maintains his record of finishing every race in the top two so far this season with the exception of the Americas round when he crashed out while leading.

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