‘Marc Márquez is going to unleash the beast in Portimão’, and it was in fact something close to that. The Spaniard attacked Jorge Martín on the last lap to take second place and managed to finish second after planning his attack in the last few laps.
In the parc fermé, the rider admitted a mistake in qualifying:
– The weekend was harder because starting from eighth was super difficult and tomorrow in the [long] race it will be even more so. I made a mistake in qualifying that I could have avoided because I engagedthe rear device too early, the bike was sitting and I crashed.
He concluded, revealing part of his strategy: ‘After that mistake the team did a great job repairing the bike and in the race I was very lucky on the first lap, I had a good start. I heated up the front tyre a bit, then relaxed a bit and went back on the attack in the last few laps. Tomorrow with the medium rear it will be a bit different’.