Factory Ducati’s Andrea Dovizioso is hoping to sharpen up in qualifying after admitting to riding his GP19 too aggressively on the opening day of the French MotoGP in Le Mans.

The World Championship challenger was fifth fastest in the combined practice times on the opening day, just 0.308 seconds off of the Yamaha of Maverick Vinales.

Whilst being in the top five, the Italian wasn’t overly happy with his riding and said a few small things required changing before tomorrow.

“We’re in the top group but we are not the fastest," said the 33-year-old.

"We still have to improve, because the feeling was not perfect, the speed was there, but I was a bit too aggressive.

“Le Mans is very tight and slow track, and the MotoGP bike is not easy to be perfect, smooth and use the best potential of the bike, it’s easy to use too much power, spinning. I wasn't comfortable. It is small thing, we are not working on big things.

"I wasn't smooth enough and we have to find something on the setup and give the possibility to ride better.

“I have to ride a bit better but we are not too far and we are still there and have a chance to really fight for the podium and victory but we need something more from today.”

Despite sounding downbeat, Dovi explained that he and his team worked on a lot of strategies and tyre combinations in a bid to find the best set up for Sunday’s race.

“We tried different setups and evaluated several tyre options,” he said.

“Making a step forward during FP2, but we still have room for improvement and we'll need to be smart and put together all the data we gathered to be even more competitive tomorrow and prepare for the race in the best possible way."