Fabio Quartararo banks “one of my greatest races” with Barcelona MotoGP P11

Fabio Quartararo has 12 Grand Prix wins, but he ranked his 11th-place finish at last weekend’s Solidarity Barcelona MotoGP as “one of my greatest races”.

The French rider had narrowly missed out on points in Saturday’s Sprint after suffering a major loss of grip at the end of the race.

That prompted him to try the hard-compound rear tyre for the Grand Prix.

“We tried the hard [compound rear tyre] that we never tried during the weekend,” Quartararo said.

“I think it was the correct choice, but we had no grip, and I had [Marco] Bezzecchi in front with the soft [compound rear tyre] who was spinning all the race and still had more grip than me at the end.

“So, clearly we know what we miss, we know what we have to improve, but I think I managed to get, to be honest, one of my greatest races.

“We finished only 10 seconds from the top, even if the position is not super-good, but I think we can be happy with the race that we managed.”

On Saturday, most riders had written off the soft-compound rear tyre as a legitimate option for the full-distance race because of the drop-off experienced in the Sprint.

However, Quartararo said he wasn’t surprised to see Francesco Bagnaia, who ultimately won the race, take the soft rear.

“I knew that Pecco [Francesco Bagnaia] was going with the soft, because [what does he have to lose],” Quartararo said.

“The pace he had was incredible, and I didn’t expect [Jorge] Martin to go with the medium [compound rear tyre], because for me the medium was dropping the same as the soft but] with less potential.

“And the hard, I didn’t know, but yesterday Alex [Rins] went with the medium, me with the soft, we both had an incredible drop.

“So I decided to try the hard, and nothing to lose at the end, and just some information.”