Crutchlow: I could have won even with Marquez in the race

LCR Honda’s Cal Crutchlow tallied up his second victory of the season following a sensational ride from the Briton in Phillip Island. Aided by Marc Marquez’ demise on lap 10, Crutchlow still reckons he could have beaten the Spaniard such was his pace and confidence.

Crutchlow will likely have been one of the pre-race weekend favourites with the forecast being so unpredictable. Despite not liking the wet conditions, he still showed strong in them and qualified his RC213V on the middle of the front row.

For the race, Crutchlow opted for the harder front tyre along with Marquez, though admitted after the race that he was ‘terrified’ when the Spaniard crashed as it brought back memories of 2014 when he fell of at the same corner on a cold tyre whilst running second. It was later revealed that Marquez’ crash was down to rider error, but he still erred on the side of caution through Turn 4 for the remainder of the race.

The Briton didn’t get the best of starts from second on the grid, and was forced to spend the opening few laps fighting his way back from fifth. On the fourth lap he moved ahead of Pol Espargaro to take second, and was soon setting a similar pace to that of Marquez several seconds up the road.

Crutchlow had begun to eat into Marquez’ advantage when the World Champion crashed out of the race, and it was this pace that the British rider felt could have seen him properly take the fight to the factory Honda.

Twitter: RT @LCRHondaTeam: Crutchlow is leading in the #AustralianGP!!! @calcrutchlow @GIVI_OFFICIAL @Castrol https://t.co/rvaODYF3iE (@MotoGP)

Once in the lead, Crutchlow still had a fight on his hands. Yamaha’s Valentino Rossi was bearing down on him and the LCR rider was forced to up his pace to keep daylight between himself and the Italian. Crutchlow eased away from Rossi over the course of 10 laps, just managing his pace as so to not overwork the front tyre or let it cool off too much.

Crutchlow is the first British rider in any class of the World Championship to win in Australia, and becomes the first Briton since Barry Sheene in 1979 to win more than one race in a season. He’s now also the first satellite rider since 2006 to achieve two or more wins in a season and is the fourth repeat winner of 2016, joining Marc Marquez, Valentino Rossi and Jorge Lorenzo on such a feat.

“I was terrified when Marc crashed out in front of me, I braked really weakly into that corner for the whole race. I knew it was critical, because I crashed there from second a couple of years ago when I had a ten-second gap behind me, so I was quite scared to be honest. With that in mind, I also knew I had to keep pushing because otherwise I would lose heat in the front tyre.

“I was actually quite confident that I could have caught Marc today, but once he crashed I just carried on at the same pace and then the last ten laps or so I didn’t really push, I just made sure I kept heat in the front. I actually pushed more on the laps when the sun wasn’t out, because when it was I could be a little more relaxed. It might sound strange, but this is Phillip Island and anything can happen.

“I’m really pleased for the LCR Honda Team, they have done a great job this weekend. I was confident I could have won even with Marquez in the race, but Honda have done a really good job with our bike, there’s no doubt about that. We can now look forward to the last two races, and then see what happens for next year.”