Vinales backed up his victory at the Qatar GP with a fifth place in the Doha race after recovering from eleventh place in the early stages due to a poor start.
He had a pace similar to that of teammate Fabio Quartararo when he carved his way through the pack, but a mistake struggling with Pramac’s Jorge Martin in the closing stages cost him a podium and dropped him behind Suzuki’s Alex Rins.
Vinales admits he asked “too much” of his Yamaha in the final laps when he went “crazy” to get on the podium.
“I think we got really good two results and we are very happy with these results home,” said Vinales after leaving Qatar four points ahead of championship leader Johann Zarco.
“I pushed a lot on the motorcycle, the last three laps I was crazy, I did it.
“I asked too much from the bike, so next time I’ll try to be gentler and get the maximum out of it if I have to fight back.
“But to fight with the Ducatis you have to be aggressive, sometimes you have to be crazy.
“And that’s what I tried, but I didn’t get the hint where Jorge was braking and I was braking too late and I was really on top of him, and so as not to touch him, I went a bit straight and there I lost the podium.
“But overall, I’m happy because the potential is there. I feel great. I feel like the team is doing the right thing. Now is the time to improve.”
Also read:
Vinales worked on his starts all winter but admitted at the Doha GP that his reaction time let him down and he almost lost the front end when he had a little wheelie off the line.
“Well, in the beginning the problem is mainly the response time, I was too slow,” he explained. “After that I got a little wheely and I almost lose the front.
“At the start I saw that I was getting smoke from the front tire. It’s true that I didn’t have the same potential in the first race, it’s true that I didn’t have the same grip.
“But even from that I was able to fill the gap and come back.
“Certainly on the first lap when I saw myself in 11th place, I said, ‘OK, save the tire and you’ll come back strong’ and I did.
“I went to one right away [engine map] Switch with no power, and in the end I was strong.
“I could do 1m54s high and 1m55s low and that made all the difference. But I think the race was good, we fight back, which is the most important thing.”
“Let’s say today was a bad day and we made P5, so that’s really important.”