Andrea Dovizioso took his first victory since the opening round in Qatar after prevailing in a tense three-way scrap with Jorge Lorenzo and Marc Marquez. The Italian led for large periods before resisting a late challenge from his team-mate Lorenzo as Ducati secured their second 1-2 finish of the season. Third place for Marquez saw him extend his championship lead over Valentino Rossi to 49 points.
With tyre management likely to play such a key role, the riders set an understandably cautious pace early on as Dovizioso led away from pole position, followed closely by Rossi, Lorenzo, Marquez and Cal Crutchlow. Although Rossi enjoyed a brief spell out in front as half-distance approached, the Yamaha rider would fall backwards once the pace quickened. At least he was still running, which was more than could be said for team-mate Maverick Vinales who was involved in a three-rider pile-up on lap one.
With only three remaining at the front, Lorenzo began his challenge for victory with a move on Marquez at turn three on lap 18. The Spaniard tried an identical pass on Dovizioso a lap later, only for his team-mate to snap straight back as Lorenzo left his braking slightly too late. This pushed Jorge back into the clutches of the no.93 Honda and although he briefly fell back again at the start of the final lap, Lorenzo made sure of second with a forceful move into turn five.
Having fallen to fifth at one point, Rossi salvaged fourth with an opportunistic manoeuvre on Crutchlow at the very last corner. Danilo Petrucci finished sixth having ran at the tail of the leading group throughout while Johann Zarco took a lonely seventh. Dani Pedrosa won a photo finish with Alvaro Bautista for eighth while Andrea Iannone won the battle of the Suzukis for tenth.
2018 Monster Energy Grand Prix Ceske Republiky: (Result)
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