With 21st place on Saturday at the Sachsenring, Vinales drove his worst MotoGP qualifying of all time and was unable to get into the points on Sunday.
Vinales found it “impossible” to overtake an Avintia Ducatis brace on the edge of the points.
The Yamaha rider has been fighting for form since winning the opening race in Qatar and has been working with a new crew chief in former Valentino Rossi ally Silvano Galbusera since Barcelona.
Satisfied with how he felt on the bike after the Barcelona test, Vinales says no one at Yamaha has answers about his form in Germany while teammate Fabio Quartararo finished third.
“I have the same question as you, so I can’t answer it,” Vinales replied when Autosport asked him to explain his problems.
“Nobody answered me, so I can’t answer.”
He added, “I’m about 15 laps behind [Luca] Marini and [Enea] Bastianini.
“I couldn’t overtake her, that was impossible with this bike. So I prepared the descent very well, you have more power and can brake later.
“Well, it’s impossible with this bike. When I arrived in Franco.” [Morbidelli] I was able to overtake quite well, only overtaking on the first try.
“But it’s a lot easier with another Yamaha, but it’s so difficult with the Ducatis.
“So when I did 10 laps there, I see that my position was maybe 13th. I said, ‘OK, I’ll let myself fall back, get some fresh air and try to get some data and see the bike alone is working’.
“At the end of the race I was able to cover 1 min. 22 minutes, which was not bad, while I drove 1 min. 23.5 seconds behind it.
“Well, it was a little different, but overall I don’t know.
“Nobody has the answers to what’s going on here, so I have to keep working, we have aces that I can be fast even with the Moto2 bike.
“So I’ll try to get the most out of it.”
Vinales says he will not change his current approach in Assen next weekend, but dejectedly admits that “my job is to collect data”.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen, it’s very difficult to say,” he said.
“For Assen, I’ll do the same thing as I did here: work, try to collect data.
“Right now my job is to collect data. It’s sad, but it is so, there is not much more I can do. I’m sorry.”