Bagnaia: ‘Very angry, 100% it wasn’t my fault’

Francesco Bagnaia suspects the stability of his 'incredible' Ducati is masking his ability to feel when the tyres are on the limit, after crashing from the lead of Sunday’s Americas MotoGP in Austin, Texas.

Peter McLaren

17 Apr 2023

Francesco Bagnaia, Grand Prix of the Americas, 14 April

Bagnaia, who overcame five DNFs in his championship-winning season, began his title defence with a perfect double in Portimao but has since squandered the early advantage by falling in both subsequent GPs.

The Italian’s latest mistake meant that - having been on course to repeat his pole-to-Sprint victory and retake the title lead from Marco Bezzecchi - he has instead forfeited 45 points due to the errors in Argentina (second) and Austin (first).

“I don't know what happened,” said Bagnaia. “Sincerely, I don't know how many laps I did this weekend. Maybe 80, maybe 100. Pushing, controlling, understanding… And then in the race when I was in total control, I crashed.

“So I'm very angry, not with myself, because I'm 100% sure that wasn't my fault today. In Argentina, I recognise that I was a bit on the limit. But today, no. Today something happened, but not in terms of a cold tyre or the wind. Something we have to understand from the bike.

“Because it's true that our bike is the best. We have the best bike in the grid, but then if you crash and you don't know why, it's useless because we lost 45 points in two weekends.

“So we have to understand that we have [to] maybe prefer a more unstable bike. But maybe I prefer to go one-tenth slower but understand better everything.

“Because right now it's very difficult. I feel unbeatable. I feel I can do everything. Like today I was going fast but without taking any risks, without doing crazy things, I was entering very calmly in corner two, because I knew that it was more slippery. And I still crashed.

“So I have to really hope that my team will help me on that because I'm sure that the potential and the performance of the GP23 is incredible. It's the best bike I’ve ever ridden. But for the race, there is something we have to understand what is happening.

“Maybe it has too much [feedback] filter because it's so stable,” he added. “Maybe we have to lose a bit of this stability, to lose a bit of filter, just to be more [feeling] on the tyres.

“Because sincerely like this, it’s perfect the bike, but if you crash and you lost 45 points in the last two weekends something is not perfect.”

With Bagnaia’s main title rivals also suffering roller-coaster form, he remains second in the standings and returns to Europe only 11 points behind VR46’s wet Argentine winner Bezzecchi. But that was of little consolation.

“Two contenders [team-mate Enea Bastianini and Repsol Honda’s Marc Marquez] are not in the championship at the moment, but this [situation] will end [soon],” he said. “So we have to keep working like we are doing, but more focus on the race to have a bike that gives me more advice [feedback].”

Bagnaia will be hoping he can repeat last year’s response to back-to-back DNFs in Barcelona and Germany (the first of which was not his fault) when he went on to win the next four races, putting him on course to overturn Fabio Quartararo’s 91-point advantage.