Danilo Petrucci: “It’s a nice feeling when you’re fighting with the top guys”
Danilo Petrucci was able to take satisfaction from his podium finish in Race 1 at the Czech WorldSBK despite being dropped by the leaders.
Although he finished over 10 seconds behind the winner, Danilo Petrucci said it was a “nice feeling” to be on the podium in Race 1 at the Czech WorldSBK.
Petrucci finished where he started in third place; the Italian was able to stick with Toprak Razgatlioglu and Nicolo Bulega ahead to begin with, but was dropped after a few laps, ultimately finishing four seconds behind World Superbike points leader Bulega.
“It’s always a nice feeling when you’re fighting with the top guys, starting from the first row, since this morning I felt so good,” Petrucci said.
“I did my strategy, [which] was to stay as close as possible to the top-two guys, but Toprak [Razgatlioglu] I knew had something more and he was really fast.
“I tried to stay with Nicolo [Bulega] but also he was faster than me [by] a couple of tenths per lap.
“But I saw that my gap was improving to the riders behind me, so I tried to manage and stay on the podium.
“It’s always good, we are improving our position in the championship which is always a good feeling.”
The chance to be on the podium came from Superpole for Petrucci, which went dramatically better for the Italian than in Cremona; there he was 13th, but in Most he was third thanks to a different strategy he used in the Czech Republic..
“I was completely alone and I just did my job,” he said.
“I’m happy because we’re working so well. We are focusing to reach third place in the championship, and trying to stay as close as possible to the top-two guys.”
Despite being able to stay within a second of the front two for the opening laps of Race 1, Petucci wasn’t optimistic of being able to challenge them more strongly on Sunday.
“At the beginning, maybe they were not pushing so much; I was doing the same [pace] but it was not my pace – I had to push a lot,” he said.
“Then, when they started to push, I did too, I started to ride faster, but the gap was improving lap-by-lap.
“I had no weapons to fight with them, but we are good and I think this is the target for tomorrow: to come back on the podium.”
Alex joined the Crash.net team in August of 2024 having covered consumer and racing motorcycle news at Visordown for two years.
