Bagnaia at a loss to explain crash

Francesco Bagnaia was left ‘angry’ and at a loss to explain the crash that cost him the chance of a double at the Grand Prix of the Americas.

The reigning MotoGP world champion crashed out of the lead on the eighth lap at Turn 2 of the Circuit of The Americas to throw away a potential 25 points.

Pole man Bagnaia, who won Saturday’s Sprint race in dominant fashion, also suffered a similar fate in the main race in Argentina at Round 2, when he slid out of second place. Together, the incidents have cost the factory Ducati rider a possible 45 points.

He still holds second in the championship standings after the first three rounds, 11 points behind VR46 Ducati’s Marco Bezzecchi.

A baffled Bagnaia said: “For a second weekend in a row, I don’t know. I’m quite angry, disappointed – not in myself, because I am quite sure that it wasn’t my fault.

“So, we need to understand it, to know why it is happening. I did many, many laps this week and we had [no] issues or [warnings], and then in the race, just controlling, I crash.

“It’s something that I’m not understanding and is something that has made me very angry, and we have to understand it because our bike is fast, so competitive, but then if you push and you don’t know why [crashes are happening] it doesn’t add to anything,” added the 26-year-old.

“It’s something that I’m not understanding. I have a lot of feeling with the front of my bike and I can push when I want, and I can control when I want – like yesterday – but today, just crashing like this was just something strange.”

Bagnaia said the incident was all the more perplexing given that he was treating Turn 2 with extra caution because of a lack of grip.

“Already, every lap in that corner, I was just saying [to myself] keep calm there because it was slippery, and I was doing that very slow, to enter without doing aggressive things,” he said.

“I lost 45 points [over two race weekends]. Fortunately, many contenders are not here to fight. If it was in a normal championship in a normal condition, I would be already 17 or 18 points behind.

“So, I have this luck this year, but losing 45 points in two weekends is not a good thing, so we have to keep focus.”