"When Mike di Meglio came by I was on my limit," he said. "When he made a gap I accepted it, and I thought, 'Bring it home and don't crash.' "
Bradley has analysed the reason for his costly crashes in two of the previous rounds. "Portugal was my fault," he was tough enough to admit. "It was inexperience in the front positions and being a bit hasty."
His fall in China he puts down to being "one of those things in wet conditions that you can't help."
But it looked clumsy when Bradley chucked the Polaris World Aprilia away again in this morning's warm-up. "I was being too aggressive," he said. "I ran wide going into the first left-hander at the chicane, and flicked it right a bit too hard."
Bradley had qualified in second place, but there was another error at the original start of the rain-interrupted race. "I thought I didn't need the clutch any more so I let it go, but we use a longer first gear at this track, and the bike just died. Then I got buried in the first corner a bit."
These mistakes dropped him to an apparently hopeless 19th place. When the race was stopped on the 15th lap he had recovered to ninth place, but a podium position hardly seemed realistic.
The event was restarted as a simple five-lap dash, with riders gridding in their finishing positions in the first part. Bradley zapped from his position at the head of the third row to the lead on the third lap, before he settled for second place.
This leaves him in eighth place in the championship table, with 36 points to the 74 of leader Di Meglio. With 12 rounds remaining, can Bradley still challenge for the title?
"The chase is wide open," he said. "There's a different winner nearly every weekend, and you have to keep consistent and keep plugging away. You can never go away from thoughts of winning the championship."
This result will prove to Bradley and his team that he has the speed to run with the quickest riders - that wasn't really in doubt - but more importantly, that he is also developing the ability to hold calm under pressure.
Sunday am - Jorge: No Qualms, No Doubts
Despite widespread fears for his safety - and that of other riders - voiced by many in the
MotoGP paddock here at Le Mans, it apparently hasn't crossed
Jorge Lorenzo's mind to pull out of today's race.
"Everything was decided yesterday - he will race," Lorenzo's assistant Hector Martín told me in the paddock this morning.
Lorenzo, who is getting about the paddock using a wheelchair and crutches, receives massage to his injured ankles and battered body in the mobile clinic before and after every practice and qualifying session at Le Mans.
