SPIELBERG, Austria (AP) - Ducati rider Andrea Dovizioso held off a late challenge by defending MotoGP champion Marc Marquez to win the Austrian GP on Sunday.
It was the Italian’s third win of the season after his back-to-back victories in Italy and Catalonia in June.
Dovizioso briefly lost the lead on the final lap but accelerated to overtake Marquez again before the final stretch and win the race by 0.176 seconds. Marquez’ Honda teammate Dani Pedrosa finished 2.661 seconds back in third.
Chasing his fourth career championship, Marquez leads the standings and is 16 points clear of Dovizioso with seven races left. Yamaha’s Maverick Vinales, who won the first two events of the season and came sixth in Sunday’s race, is eight points further back in third. The next race is the British GP at Silverstone on Aug. 27.
Marquez started from pole position for the fifth time this season but was overtaken by Ducati’s Jorge Lorenzo in the first lap.
With Lorenzo dropping to fourth position halfway through the race, Marquez and Dovizioso swapped the lead several times until Pedrosa caught up with the leading pair with eight laps to go. Davizioso finally seemed heading for victory until he had to fight off a gutsy move by Marquez just seconds before the finish.
It was Ducati’s second straight victory on the Red Bull Ring since the Austrian GP returned to the calendar last year. In 2016, Andrea Iannone triumphed ahead of Dovizioso. Now riding for Suzuki, Iannone came 11th in Sunday’s race.
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