Jack Miller has expressed his surprise at Jorge Martin’s attempted pass for the podium which resulted in the Spaniard crashing on the final lap of the Austrian MotoGP.
The ‘Martinator’ lunged at his Ducati stablemate at the uphill Turn 1 right-hander, but folded his front wheel and went down.
“He went for a lunge, much as he did in Silverstone at Turn 1,” said the Ducati Lenovo Team rider of Martin.
“I don’t know if he wanted to stay on the track or not but I grabbed a bit more brake in the straight-line braking just to try and get the cutback, and thankfully I did that and was able to avoid a bike sliding across the track.
“So, unfortunate for him, but it made my last lap a bit more chill, so that was alright.”
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The Prima Pramac Racing rider was not too fazed by his crash, however, explaining to MotoGP’s official website, “I had to try or I would not sleep tonight.”
One overtake which did impress Miller was that which championship leader Fabio Quartararo put on him to nick second spot on Lap 25.
The Monster Energy Yamaha rider braked to the outside of the #43 Ducati at the right-hander of the new chicane, then rolled past as they flicked through ‘Turn 2b’ on the way out of the complex.
It came after Miller had gone under Bagnaia for the lead on Lap 7 at Turn 9 but was unable to make the move stick.
‘Jackass’ thinks that might have been decisive, considering he then suffered for front tyre temperature as he followed the other works Desmosedici.
“I had a fantastic bike, a bike good enough for fighting for the victory,” declared Miller.
“I felt like I needed to get that move done. As Pecco said, he knew my intentions at that point in time because I’d been behind Enea [Bastianini] and himself and we both had the soft front and I knew I needed to get some cool air on that thing.
“So, I had a lunge and I wasn’t quite able to pull it off, and was just suffering a little bit to try and get it to pull up after that.
“He was able to put the hammer down and creep out a tenth here, a tenth there, and that was it.
“Later on in the race, I really started suffering. I don’t know if it was from the amount of time spent behind other bikes [but] I started suffering quite a bit in the left-hand corners which were my stronger point at the beginning of the race.
“Just especially in that chicane, I wasn’t able to attack as aggressively as I would like, I was having to sort of be conservative and prepare and get the exit and then Fabio came past me and made me look silly through there.
“So, hat off to him, he rode a fantastic race to come through because he was quite a bit back there at one point.”
Miller’s third podium in the last four races sees him climb to fifth in the championship, two points behind Johann Zarco.
Next up is the San Marino Grand Prix, at Misano on September 2-4.
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