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Fabio Quartararo tried until the very end to overtake Morbidelli and give Yamaha and himself a well-deserved podium, but at the checkered flag of the Qatar Sprint Race he finished fifth, overtaken in the last lap also by the Ducati rider Aldeguer, who was able to take advantage of a moment of difficulty for the Frenchman.
"It was good today - said Fabio - I tried everything I could so much that, unfortunately, in the final lap I lost the front three times and in the last one even worse thus facilitating Fermin's overtake on me. In any case we have to be happy with what we did. We hope tomorrow to confirm the good pace. The overtaking attempt on Franco? He was too far away. Even though I lift off very late it was not possible for me to hold his acceleration to try to overtake him."
And about those frantic phases El Diablo said, "I was pushing hard because I could feel the pressure from Aldeguer. I noticed that Frankie was suffering a bit and despite our engine being weaker than the Ducati's I was able to stay in his slipstream. That said, we are behind overall. We lack power, aerodynamics and grip, so thinking about overtaking is complicated."
Returning instead to Qualifying, the 25-year-old acknowledged, "I knew I would have a good lap even though I didn't imagine so good. It's been a long time since I've been able to go to the limit and not make mistakes. The M1 certainly adapts well to the Lusail track and we have to take advantage of that. It's not often that we are so competitive over the one lap. Even 1"2 faster than 2024 is really good, and in view of the race in the Sprint I got an idea of where to push and where to be conservative because we wear out the tires more than the others."
Finally on the Sunday race he declared that he was realistic and far from flights of fancy, "I expect to do worse. When the tire doesn't drop it's fine, but then I don't know. We already have to be satisfied like this, then of course, a surprise might happen."
