Leading the Championship by a single point ahead of his teammate Jorge Lorenzo during this weekend's Motul Grand Prix, Valentino Rossi had to make a strong statement in Assen to fend off his teammate's assault. The Doctor delivered.

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From the moment he arrived in Assen, he always pointed out his bad qualifying in the past few races that led him to lose a few seconds and prevented him to fight for the victories in some races where he rode strong. All weekend "The Doctor" showed a glimpse of his capability to lead the timesheets, topping the FP1 and the rain-affected FP3 to automatically qualify to Q1.

However, The Doctor had a surprise in Qualifying session yesterday, shocking everyone when he set a stunning lap of 1 min 32.627s in the closing minute of the session. The Italian's qualifying time smashed Team Suzuki Ecstar Aleix Espargaro's already impressive lap time of 1 min 32.858s, giving him the pole for the first time since topping the qualifying session in Valencia last year via the Guardian.

With the momentum on his side this weekend, Rossi took the pole position advantage this time over his teammate and Spanish rival Lorenzo, whose subpar qualifying performance put him 8th on the grid at The Cathedral.

Before the race began this afternoon, Valentino was expecting a tight battle between two-time champ Marc Marquez and Lorenzo. Soon as the lights went out, The Doctor had a perfect start to the line maintaining his lead on Turn 1 ahead of the streaking Marc Marquez, while Lorenzo also kept himself within striking distance with a perfect launch that allowed him to overtake several riders and take the 3rd position.

In the early stage of the race, Lorenzo kept his pace with both Vale and Marquez, but as the race progressed, the two leaders started clocking fewer than 1 min 33s laps, which was too much ground for the Spaniard to cover.

With Rossi dictating the flow of the race, the reigning MotoGp World Champion Marc Marquez kept on matching his pace and stayed on his back through several laps. The Spaniard then made his move as he finally overtook the Doctor with seven laps to go in the race.

However, the seven-time MotoGP titlist displayed the true grit of a champion, putting his M1 in perfect position to overtake Marquez on the last lap and clinch the win at Assen. Lorenzo finished in a lonely 3rd, +14.576 behind Marquez who finally returned to the podium after two consecutive crashes.  

This victory in Assen marked the 7th time for The Doctor, who passed the legend Giacomo Agostini as the rider who had the most wins on this circuit via MotoGP.com. Now, leading by 10 points in the Championship Standings ahead of his teammate, The Doctor is looking forward to build up his lead at Sachsenring in the next couple of weeks.

TagsMotul Grand Prix, Valentino Rossi, Assen, The Doctor, Valencia, Marc Marquez