Jorge Lorenzo retired in late 2019, a season he had switched to Honda and suffered serious injuries. The Mallorcan realized that he no longer had the necessary motivation to continue and decided to quit. As is so often the case, it could have turned out differently.
Lorenzo himself confessed this in front of the microphones of DAZN Spain and identified the turning point of his fall at the Assen GP: “Without this accident, I would without a doubt have stayed with Honda”.
Jorge crashed with two fractured vertebrae in free practice for the TT Assen, so that he had to miss four races.
“Retirement became possible after Assen, but I didn’t want to rush it and put it off as long as possible,” he continued. With a metaphor, continuing would have been like having a “very high mountain and I couldn’t muster the patience or motivation to climb it “.
After all, the Mallorcan had achieved a lot from his very early career and at some point he realized that the game was no longer worth the risk.
“At the age of 30, 31 or 32 you become more cautious and I noticed that – he explained – Every fall with a major injury is like a rock that adds your mental backpack full of negative experiences that make you more cautious. “