Ducati's Bagnaia Thrills Italian Fans with MotoGP Win

There was no place like home on Sunday for Pecco Bagnaia and the Ducati Lenovo Team.

Bagnaia started fifth on the grid at the MotoGP race at Autodromo Internazionale del Mugello in Tuscany before fighting his way to the front and holding off series points leader and defending champion Fabio Quartararo on his Yamaha for the win by a margin of 0.635 seconds.

"For us Italians, this is a very important race, so this is definitely a special victory," Bagnaia said. "Mugello is a challenging track, but we worked all weekend perfectly to achieve this result, and we did it. Yesterday in FP3, I destroyed the bike, but my team worked so hard to allow me to use it today in the race, so I have to thank them! After the start, I found myself bottled up, and some riders passed me. I knew that by staying calm, I could make a comeback. I'm happy, and I think we really deserved this win."

Bagnaia fell to eighth on the first lap before battling his way to the front while passing Johann Zarco, Brad Binder, Aleix Espargaro and Fabio Di Giannantonio, he was then able to slip past both Luca Marini's Desmosedici GP and  Quartararo in a single move, moving up into second. 

After four laps, Pecco finally passed Marco Bezzecchi and moved into first place finishing ahead of the championship leader Quartararo.

Thanks to his victory, Bagnaia moves into fourth position in the overall standings, 41 points behind the Quartararo. 

Ducati increases its advantage in the Constructors' Championship to 59 points, and the Ducati Lenovo Team is now second, just 7 points behind the leader in the Teams' classification.

Bagnaia's teammate Jack Miller had a rough day and finished in 15th place. He is 18 points behind Bagnaia in the championship points standings. 

Round nine of the series is next Sunday at Catalunya, Spain.