MotoGP: Crutchlow ‘out to go one better’ at home

Cal Crutchlow says he’s out to go one better than last year at his home race this weekend, as he sets out to improve on last year’s second place at the British Grand Prix on Sunday.

The LCR Honda racer scored the impressive runner-up position last year behind Maverick Viñales, taking the fight to Valentino Rossi and Marc Marquez in the closing stages of the race to deliver an impressive result – but he says that he feels he can go one better this year if things align in his favour.

“I don’t know if I can do better last year, but I’ll give the same as I did last year. Because last year I made a mistake – I gave up too much battling early on, where if I had put my head down I maybe could have gone with Maverick at the start of the race. But I’d like to think that I can be as competitive with lap times, even though I think the pace is going to be a little bit faster too.

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“Marc will be the man to beat this year for sure, but I have to aim for the podium again. I’ve done it once now, so I think that I have to aim for that level again, because once you’ve done something once there’s no reason why you can’t do it again. As long as we can do a good job and put on a good show I’ll be happy – but I’ll still be aiming to go one better.

“You always think to go one better at Silverstone would be fantastic, but the reality is that it’s very hard to do. Maverick on a Yamaha and Marc being really strong makes it even harder, and even Dovi with the speed advantage Ducati has will make it very difficult. But don’t get me wrong – I’m not going in thinking about anything less than a win.”

However, there’s one thing that might swing things out of his favour – if the British weather lives up to expectations and the rain comes on Sunday.

“If it rains, it’s a very different story. I’ve had a bad run this year in the rain compared to my usual form. I don’t feel great in the rain with the bike while Marc feels great with it and Dani feels good. I feel like it’s worse than last year in the rain, where last year I qualified on pole position by a mile and was able to push and take risks. I really hope it doesn’t rain!”

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