Italy's two-time MotoGP champ
Francesco Bagnaia on Sunday lost his title to Spain's Jorge
Martin after the Italian Ducati rider won the season-ending
Barcelona race but the Spanish Ducati Pramac rider came third,
beating Bagnaia by 10 points in the final standings.
Martin, who will ride for Aprilia next year, would have had to
finish ninth and Bagnaia first for the Turin-born 27-year-old to
keep the crown.
Bagnaia won 11 MotoGPs and seven Sprint races this year.
Martin, 26, who has won his first title, said "it was tough to
ride at the end because I was crying".
In the interviews immediately after the race, Bagnaia said only
a few words to compliment Martin, saying "I don't want to take
the spotlight away from him, he deserves that number 1".
Then he kept himself on the sidelines.
"Jorge made the difference, I didn't see the point of taking the
spotlight on his day of celebration," he later explained to Sky.
"However, the awareness of having been the strongest of the
season remains, but I paid for too many zeros, due to my
mistakes.
"But if you lose in the right way, there is nothing dishonorable
in defeat.
"Regrets? I've always paid attention to the feeling on the bike
and in the first part of the season I underestimated this, I
regret not having insisted a bit more in this aspect.
"Then there was the retirement due to a technical problem and
three mistakes of mine, the most avoidable at Silverstone,
because I pushed too much and it wasn't necessary".
The race was moved to Barcelona from Valencia after the deadly
floods there.
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