Bagnaia wants Argentina MotoGP struggles “to be a lesson to me"

The four-time MotoGP race winner was lucky to escape punishment for braking hard on the main straight out of frustration at the end of Saturday’s FP2 when got caught up in traffic.

He ultimately failed to make it into Q2 and was unable to get out of Q1 in qualifying, with Bagnaia ending up 14th – although he was promoted a spot due to a grid penalty for team-mate Jack Miller.

After discovering a set-up that offered him more front-end confidence, Bagnaia managed to rise up the order to fifth in Sunday’s race.

“I would like to let this weekend be a lesson to me,” Bagnaia admitted after the race.

“Thanks to what I did [in qualifying], today I was more calm and I would like to understand what happened yesterday and not let it happen again.

“I’m sure with the race of today I will be more competitive in America, already last year I was competitive there and I think this year we can be a bit better.

“One thing that will be important will be to not have pressure, be smart, be calm and restart with what we did today.

“P5 for sure is not the main objective, but it’s helpful for the future to restart and think again about being on top.”

He added: “We did a really good job this morning in the warm-up.

“I found my feeling back with the front finally. I was feeling that already in Mandalika, but was less than now.

“Now I was able to do what I wanted with the front of the bike, everything was better, I was pushing hard on the brakes and the bike was helping me do those things.

Francesco Bagnaia, Ducati Team

Photo by: MotoGP

“I was really needing a race like this. It’s ok that I started behind but was my fault.

“I already apologised to the team because they are working a lot in the box and just because I was nervous and angry I started