Alex Rins: Aggressive Johann Zarco 'destroyed my race'

Alex Rins starts the MotoGP summer break with a meagre ten points from the seven rounds since returning to Europe from Qatar.

After a string of accidents and then a wrist fracture during a bicycle accident before Catalunya, Rins rode to eleventh on his return to Suzuki duties at the Sachsenring.

Just a few days later and the Spaniard looked much stronger at Assen, believing he was poised to be part of the podium fight after climbing from seventh to fifth on the opening lap.

But Rins' hopes of a strong race ended soon after when contact from Johann Zarco during a pass at Turn 10 sent Rins wide into the gravel, re-joining 22nd and last.

"I think everybody saw it. Very very unlucky. I mean, if I wasn't there, maybe he goes wide," Rins said. "I didn't expect that overtake, and the problem was his wing hit my arm, and I had the wing down my arm.

"So the only thing that was possible to do was to pick up the bike to avoid him. And I went to the gravel, last position, trying later to recover a bit of time.

"Very unlucky because the lap time was there. The pace was good, it was not to win, but it was to finish in the top 3, top 4. But he destroyed our race.

"Since he came to MotoGP in 2017, he is so aggressive on the overtakes. But I mean, it was an idiotic move, because he's there, fighting for the world championship, so imagine if we had crashed together. It makes no sense."

Does the close nature of MotoGP this season mean passing has inevitably become more aggressive?

"I don't know. If you ask other riders, maybe one or two riders would complain about me. But I overtook a lot of riders today during this race, because I was last and I finished in P11, and I think nobody can complain about my overtaking. So that's all," Rins said.

Zarco, who went on to finish fourth and remains second in the world championship, was unaware of Rins' anger but is ready to speak with him about the incident.

"I didn’t know that he was upset," said the Pramac Ducati rider. "It's true that we had contact but it's not an easy corner and in that moment of the race I feel I want to stay with the top group.

"It was my strong area, Turns 9-10. I even tried to overtake Vinales in that place but Vinales was a bit faster, so I went wide. But with Rins it's true that we touched because when you try to attack there, it's not easy to stay inside, but clearly I was fully under control.

"I don’t know what happened, if then he went totally outside of the track or not… As I said, people can some straight to me if they need to speak. It's the way I'm doing it."

The contact was declared a racing incident by the FIM Stewards.