{"id":662208,"date":"2026-05-10T17:14:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-10T17:14:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/662208\/"},"modified":"2026-05-10T17:14:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-10T17:14:10","slug":"pecco-bagnaia-we-know-why-i-crashed-in-le-mans-motogp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/662208\/","title":{"rendered":"Pecco Bagnaia: \u201cWe know why I crashed\u201d in Le Mans MotoGP"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Pecco Bagnaia\u2019s promising Le Mans weekend came to a frustrating conclusion when he crashed out of second place midway through the French MotoGP.<\/p>\n<p>After dropping from pole to fifth on the opening lap, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.crash.net\/motogp\/racer\/911999\/francesco-bagnaia\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Bagnaia <\/a>fought back up to second place behind title leader <a href=\"https:\/\/www.crash.net\/motogp\/racer\/995158\/marco-bezzecchi\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Marco Bezzecchi<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Bagnaia remained behind the Aprilia rider and looked firmly in contention for a first Sunday podium of the season, to add to his runner-up finish in the Sprint.<\/p>\n<p>However, a worsening \u201cissue\u201d was affecting his front confidence, and Bagnaia was eventually caught out at the first chicane on lap 16 of 27.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe worked well and improved a lot this weekend. We were there in the race today, and even though we&#8217;re struggling a lot at the starts, I managed to get back up to speed,\u201d Bagnaia told Sky Italia.<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p>\u201cUnfortunately, we had a small issue, and lap after lap, I was losing confidence in the front end, trying to maintain the same pace. It can happen, and we&#8217;ll try to work on it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe know why I crashed, so the team is definitely working on it, but it&#8217;s not human error, and it can happen.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/motogp_lap_times.png\"   type=\"image\/png\" alt=\"2026 French MotoGP: Lap Times.\" loading=\"lazy\" style=\"aspect-ratio:2.24\"\/> <\/p>\n<p>2026 French MotoGP: Lap Times.<\/p>\n<p> \u00a9\u00a0Peter McLaren<\/p>\n<p>Bagnaia added that the unspecified issue was &#8220;the same as last time\u201d, referring to his mid-race crash at the previous Spanish Grand Prix.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This loss of confidence happened in the last seven laps or so, and unfortunately, it got worse until I couldn&#8217;t turn in as I wanted.<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut we know precisely why I crashed, and that&#8217;s something that helps us a lot.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were fast all weekend, we took pole. Today we were there, we were behind Bez at the start, but I was able to manage it all pretty well, and unfortunately what happened, happened.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Despite the DNF, Bagnaia insists he\u2019s feeling confident for next weekend\u2019s Catalunya round.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I have full confidence in the work we&#8217;re doing, and I&#8217;m sure we&#8217;ll arrive in Barcelona next week having made a big step forward since testing, and I hope we can make another step forward to get on par with, or better than, Aprilia.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>After Bagnaia&#8217;s exit, Aprilia went on to fill all three places on the podium with Jorge Martin, Bezzecchi and Ai Ogura.<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p>Bagnaia was the only factory Ducati rider on track after team-mate and reigning champion <a href=\"https:\/\/www.crash.net\/motogp\/racer\/1654\/marc-marquez\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Marc Marquez<\/a> returned to Madrid for surgery following Saturday\u2019s Sprint accident.<\/p>\n<p>Marquez will miss his the Barcelona <a href=\"https:\/\/www.crash.net\/motogp\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">MotoGP <\/a>event.<\/p>\n<p>Subscribe to our MotoGP Newsletter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pecco Bagnaia\u2019s promising Le Mans weekend came to a frustrating conclusion when he crashed out of second place&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":662209,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,17197,8456,7607,5745,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":["post-662208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-ducati","tag-ducati-lenovo-team","tag-francesco-bagnaia","tag-motogp","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/662208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=662208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/662208\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/662209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=662208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=662208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=662208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}