MotoGP Sepang: Quartararo ‘pushed like hell’ to keep title ‘mystery’ alive

Yamaha’s Fabio Quartararo kept hopes of retaining his MotoGP title alive, just, with a fightback from 12th to the Malaysian GP podium.

A crash in Saturday’s FP3 left the current champion on the deck and in need of medical intervention after breaking a finger on his left hand. The Frenchman later struggling in qualifying as he prepared to line the Monster Energy M1 up in 12th on Sunday’s grid.

“Not a big crash but a stupid crash,” Quartararo admitted. “I mean, normal crash but just break my finger and of course was really painful. Adrenaline is a great painkiller and also fighting for that kind of position. I think my finger was something else but as soon as it stopped, right now I feel the hurt in the finger! Doesn’t matter because we give everything and that’s what we wanted today.”

A storming start left Quartararo fifth by the close of lap one with Marc Marquez blocking his path until the Spaniard was dispatched four laps later. While the 23-year-old was unable to hook into the battling duo of eventual winner Pecco Bagnaia and Enea Bastianini, he had his own Ducati issues for the tail end of the action. Marco Bezzecchi keeping the number 20 honest from the halfway stage before fading slightly as the race wound down with third position the reward.

“I hoped not for the victory of Pecco of course but at least we give our maximum today,” Quartararo explained on Sunday afternoon. “The start was the key point, the first lap. We changed a little bit the strategy compared to Australia, that wanted to keep the tyre fresh for the end but today I just push myself quite hard in the beginning because our bike is not super good in saving the tyre. I had to push three/four laps till I was in front of Marc so was pretty good and I’m