Dashboard drama ends in shutdown for Andrea Dovizioso

A blank dashboard left the Italian without any bike information or the ability to change maps and activate launch control.

Nonetheless, he climbed from 16th to 12th on the opening lap of the soaking wet race, gaining another position soon after.

By then he was also fighting a loose left handlebar grip and, after dropping two places, his M1 finally switched off completely on lap 7 of 20.

"From when I switched on the bike the dashboard didn't work and I couldn't see anything. I couldn't put the launch control, couldn’t see the gear or change the map," Dovizioso said.

"I almost stalled the bike because I didn't have the launch control. I also had a problem with the left grip on the handlebar from the first lap, as it was turning around. So it was difficult to ride in a normal way. I didn't want to finish this way but it was an electronics issue.

"I'm disappointed because I felt quite good with the bike and I was in an acceptable position. The conditions were on the limit because you couldn't see, but the track was okay, apart from the [loose] stones.

"Without these problems and a better grid position, I could have done a good race. Fabio (Quartararo) showed that. So congratulations to him."

Quartararo had suffered a similar 'shut down' on his factory-spec M1 earlier in the weekend, with stone damage cited as a possible factor.

Team manager Wilco Zeelenberg said: “For Andrea it was of course a big drama, as from the start his dash didn’t work properly.

"He was able to start without problems, but after just some laps, he found another issue [handlebar grip] and on top of that the bike stopped, so he needed to finish early. We are of course very disappointed about that."

On the other side of the RNF garage, rookie team-mate Darryn Binder rode to an excellent tenth place on the year-old A Spec bike.