Nakagami: I tried to close the door, but Binder was much faster

Takaaki Nakagami impressively came from tenth on the grid to take fifth place at the Styrian MotoGP - his best result of the season. 

Nakagami made up two spots during the early laps as he got ahead of team-mate Alex Marquez and Francesco Bagnaia, while also taking advantage of Marc Marquez and Aleix Espargaro running off track due to contact for the second time. 

After making his way to fifth, the LCR Honda rider then began to close in on Johann Zarco.

Nakagami got ahead of the Pramac Ducati rider on the final lap, however, that position soon went the way of Brad Binder. The South African was the fastest man on track at the time, thus making it difficult to stop the KTM rider. 

Nakagami thought about trying to regain that position with a move at the final corner, but was reluctant to do so after receiving a track limits warning.

"Yeah in the end I’m really happy to finish P5, really close to P4. In the end of the race; I mean the last lap was good. We were strong in braking at turn three and able to overtake Zarco," said Nakagami.

"Then I tried to close the door, but Binder was much faster than us. I was thinking to try again on the last corner but I already got the track limit warning in the beginning of the race, so I cannot attack again. 

"Anyway, P5 is good from P10 on the grid. I want to thank my team because after the qualifying yesterday I was not feeling good enough, we are not ready for the fight for the good positions. 

"But last night we had a big meeting with my team to discuss what we can improve for the race, and with some small adjustments from yesterday on the bike I felt much better."