Miguel Oliveira completed many firsts with his maiden MotoGP win at the Red Bull Ring, among them a first premier class win for Portugal and the same for his Red Bull Tech3 team and he did it with screams of joy in his helmet.
The youngster, who as a trainee dentist is used to screaming, said he saw the potential of a first win some time ago and the chance to switch tyres at the re-start gave him the front-end feeling he needed.
“Just screaming and pure joy to have done it finally. I saw this coming already quite a few races ago. I felt we had the potential to do it, so finally to be able to do it is a huge boost to be able to continue like this," said the Portugese, speaking at the track.
“I’m glad we got a second chance because I was able to change the front tyre. I went on the medium front, I didn’t feel like this was the right choice, when we stopped I changed the front to the hard and I felt immediately better. This allowed me to be out there in front and fight for the podium.
The last couple of corners were just taking advantage of the fight in front of me. I knew that here in Spielberg, the last couple of turns, if a rider is very close he is going to try and go for it.
“Knowing Jack and knowing Pol, I knew they were going to tangle a little bit. So, I said ‘OK, I will stay here and work on my exit a little bit’, and to cross the line, very emotional, very happy.”
Team boss Herve Poncharal added: “What an incredible day, incredible emotions! It is something like 40 years we’ve been in this business and we never won a MotoGP race. Honestly, I thought that was never going to happen and today our dream came true.
"Here in Austria, which is in front of our title sponsor Red Bull, in front of the KTM management, our manufacturer.
"I would like also to dedicate this victory to Miguel, because he has been pushing a lot. Year one was not easy, he was injured the second half of the season.
"We’ve been fast since the beginning of this year, the bike improved, he improved, but we could never really show it due to some racing circumstances and I knew he could do it. Now we’ve done it."
