Factory Ducati rider Andrea Dovizioso said that being on the front row is a dream for him and his Ducati team as he starts the final MotoGP race of 2018 from third place at the Ricardo Tormo Circuit.

The Italian has second place in the World Championship wrapped up and said that he is delighted to be starting on the front row of the grid, especially with the heavy rain forecast during tomorrow’s 27-lap MotoGP race.

“I’m happy about the improvement of this morning because we expected that improvement but you have to be on track to confirm that,” said the Ducati man.

“We changed the balance of the bike and it was much better. With the quantity of the water we found this morning, our bike worked quite well. We have to see tomorrow in the race if there will be heavy rain, how the bike can work.

“But overall it was a really good day because we become competitive.

Despite a qualifying crash, which saw him injury, his left shoulder, 2018 World Champion Marc Marquez still managed to qualify just half a tenth behind Dovizioso in fifth position. The Italian believes he has good pace, but Marquez is stronger.

“Marc has something more I think, a little bit more, but in Valencia anything can happen, 27 laps is a long race, we have to see how much water there will be on the track,” he said.

“In the qualifying everybody takes a lot of risks, it was easy to make a mistake, especially in free practice four. We take time to try and get the rhythm and get ready for qualifying.

“The lap time was good and I’m happy. I did some mistake in my good lap so to be on the first row is a dream for us, it’s the best place and it was our goal. But the race is a different story.

“Let see if it will be dry or wet, I think we have good pace, but we found strange and different conditions in every practice, so we have to wait to see the conditions of the race.”

With nothing left to play for in 2018 for Dovizioso, the Italian will likely have half an eye to next weeks two-day post-season test at the same circuit. Whilst remaining coy on the 2019 Desmosedici, Dovi did admit that there were new pieces for him to test next week.

“I’m happy because this year we have some new parts already after the race for the first test on Tuesday,” Dovizioso said.

“We will see as we are in a different situation to the past, now our base is good so we don’t have to change the project, we have to improve a little bit to our limit, and it’s not easy as the bike is working well.

“But we are really focused on that because this year we showed more than last year how fast we can be.

“Especially in the second part of the championship we become very competitive and we fight almost every race against Marc, but it’s not enough. Marc is very strong and I think Yamaha and Suzuki become better in the last part of the season and I expect them to be faster next season.”