Reale Avintia Ducati’s Karel Abraham has complained of health issues, while Suzuki’s Joan Mir calls the French MotoGP warm-up lap crash a ‘shame’.
While it didn’t rain during on Sunday of the French GP weekend to affect the Moto3, Moto2 and MotoGP races but the track was still slippery under the overcast conditions. Even with that situation, it was still a bizarre start to the premier class action.
Even before the riders made the official start, Abraham and Rins crashed out on the warm-up lap in the same way as if they practiced it together in the same corner after losing control of their bike at the entry of the left-hander.
The duo tried to start the crashed bike but then rushed to the pits to get on with their second machine. While Rins made it out and completed the French GP in 16th, Abraham was shown a black flag for not adhering to the pitlane start procedure.
The riders were naturally livid with the incident as they couldn’t understand how it happened. On Abraham’s part, the Czech had a good qualifying and looked set for a points finish but the crash hurt his back and head with the added disappointment.
“The weekend was pretty good,” started Abraham. “We were happy to make a good qualifying and I felt very confident before the race to fight to enter the points zone. I think we could have done it but on the warm-up lap I went straight and I fell.
“I think that behind me Joan Mir also went to the floor. It has been all very strange. Now my back and head hurts because of the fall. I’m disappointed, really upset because I knew we could get a couple of points in this race instead we go with a big zero again.”
At the same time, for Mir, it was his fourth crash which he says he will investigate as to what went wrong with the team. “What happened on the warm-up lap was a shame,” he said. “I think the tyre was cold, I didn’t brake too hard or too early, but I lost the front.
“I crashed four times this weekend and we have to look into why that happened. I don’t feel that I over-pushed at any time, but when I can figure out why I crashed I can hopefully learn something from it.”
While Mir’s teammate Alex Rins climbed up to finish 10th – and made a special post-race gesture for the fallen marshal – but Abraham’s teammate Tito Rabat had to retire as well on the warm-up lap itself after a chain break on the rear of his Ducati.
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