Takaaki Nakagami has apologised for his role in the Catalan MotoGP’s stunning first corner incident.
The Japanese rider collided with Francesco Bagnaia and Alex Rins after losing the front of his Honda while braking.
Bagnaia was able to get back on his bike and return to the pits to retire before testing the next day, but Rins’ participation in the German MotoGP is still in doubt due to a fractured wrist following the crash.
Despite the fact that it was his own head hitting Bagnaia’s rear tyre that caused the Ducati Lenovo Team entry to crash, Nakagami escaped serious injury. The LCR Honda rider later apologised to Bagnaia and Rins on Twitter, posting a photo from his hospital bed in Barcelona.
“First of all, I want to apologize to @Rins42 @suzukimotogp, and @PeccoBagnaia @ducaticorse for the accident at turn 1,” wrote the Idemitsu LCR rider. “I’m really sorry destroyed your race.”
“It was a scary one but fortunately I’m OK, no serious injury. I’ll try to recovery asap.”
The stewards ruled the crash to be a racing incident and therefore Nakagami was not penalised.
“The FIM MotoGP Stewards reviewed the Turn 1 incident between riders Takaaki Nakagami, Alex Rins and Francesco Bagnaia from every angle,” MotoGP said in a statement.
“On the evidence provided by the multitude of angles available to the Stewards, including footage from the helicopter, it was judged a racing incident with no further action to be taken.
“Nakagami gained a number of positions in acceleration to move forward from his grid position. He was judged to have braked at a similar time to riders around him, gaining no significant distance on the brakes to indicate otherwise.
“Rider #30 then lost the front end and crashed, with motorcycle and rider thereafter making contact with Rins and Bagnaia.
“The established threshold for such incidents to incur a penalty is for a rider to clearly be seen carrying much too much speed, with no reasonable expectation of making the corner.”
