“I accept it and we keep quiet”

Marc Marquez says he would like to ‘accept and remain quiet’ about his late-race clash with Fabio di Giannantonio in the Dutch Grand Prix.

The factory Ducati rider was defending fourth position with six laps to run at Assen when di Giannantonio launched an attack heading into the final chicane.

The two riders made contact at the apex, forcing Marquez wide into the gravel, while di Giannantonio also ran well beyond the white line as they exited onto the start-finish straight. 

The reigning champion immediately lost ground after losing momentum, falling behind his Gresini-mounted brother Alex Marquez into sixth, while di Giannantonio carried on in fourth place.

The VR46 rider was handed a long lap penalty by the stewards for cutting the chicane after failing to cede the advantage gained, dropping him to sixth.

However, it ultimately made no difference to his finishing position, as he fought past the Marquez brothers to reclaim fourth place.

Asked for his opinion on the clash, Marquez said: “It was a racing incident — that’s what Race Direction said, because he wasn’t penalised for the contact but for cutting the chicane.

“So we accept the decision. It was a racing incident and that’s it. I accept it, keep quiet and race — that’s all.”

The incident between Marquez and di Giannantonio evoked memories of the famous tangle between the Spaniard and his arch-rival Valentino Rossi in 2015.

On the final lap, then-Honda rider Marquez sent his bike up the inside of Rossi’s Yamaha at the same part of the track, leading to both riders making contact.

Rossi went straight through over the gravel to claim victory, while Marquez was forced to settle for second position. The race direction deemed the clash between the pair a racing incident at that time.

When told about the parallels between the two clashes, Marquez quipped: “At least in 2015, I made the chicane!”

After losing his second battle with di Giannantonio, Marquez crossed the finish line in sixth, but was docked one position for going off track on the final lap, leaving him seventh behind Tech3’s Enea Bastianini.

Having won the last two grands prix in Balaton Park and Brno, he ended the race 10s down on winner Ai Ogura.

However, the 33-year-old never expected to run at the sharp end this weekend, having claimed his target was simply to survive the weekend.

“I went out and I knew that my place was finishing sixth, seventh and eighth,” he said. “It’s true that looking at the race, the maximum was fifth place but in the end we finished seventh.

“The good thing is that we escaped from Holland without injuries, so this was my main target.”

He added: “Assen has very high speed corners but I’m struggling a lot from the [change of direction from the] left corner to the right one, especially if I need to change from the left and arrive at a brake point on the right side. 

“There is where I’m struggling more and today this is where the people attack me.” 

Marquez was the only frontrunner to run the soft rear tyre in the race, a decision he and his team took just before the start. The Spaniard explained that his physical limitations eventually determined his tyre choice on one of the most demanding tracks on the calendar.

“I don’t have the physical condition to take the maximum potential of the tyre on [all] laps. So I said, ‘I will ride the bike slowly and just push single laps’, and to push single laps the soft rear was better,” he explained.

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— The Motorsport.com Team