Alex Rins says he is lucky to have even made the end of the Spanish Grand Prix after revealing he “completely lost the front” of his Suzuki at Turn 11.
The Spaniard was forced to recover from a poor qualifying for the second time in as many weeks, although unlike in Portimao last weekend- where he finished fourth after starting 23rd – he struggled to make much progress after “having a lot of problems” with the front of his GSX-RR.
Rins says he felt “really tight” as a result, though his disastrous eventual finishing position of 19th– a result that has seen him fall from the joint championship lead to now 20 points back in fourth – was sealed after he “completely lost the front ” at Turn 11 mid-way through the encounter, a moment that caused him to run off into the gravel trap bordering the bend and drop to the rear of the field.
“In Turn 11 I completely lost the front, I don’t know how I saved it but I went out into the gravel so fast,” explained Rins.
“I was suffering a lot with the front, throughout the race I had a lot of locking on the front and having a lot of problems.
“Then after re-joining the race from the gravel I was last bit riding quite well, not at the pace of Pecco (Bagnaia) and Fabio (Quartararo) but about the same as Joan (Mir), but the feeling was a disaster.
“At the start we had the problem where we were stuck between Pol Espargaro and (Enea) Bastianini so I had to roll off the throttle, and then in the second corner I was hit by a rider onto the kerb on the outside and I lost a lot of positions.
“I was really tight on the bike and I couldn’t carry a lot of corner speed and I had to wait a lot to get on the throttle in the fast corners.
“We need to analyze why because this is the first time this has happened, so we need to find out why.
“Then lap by lap I was trying to overtake the riders, but I couldn’t stop the bike in the hard-braking corners like Turns 1 and 6, so we lost a lot.
“We lost some points today but there are a lot of races remaining, so we’ll work hard to make progress in the (Monday) test and head to Le Mans.”