Jack Miller says he was just “going along for the ride” after the seat of his Pramac Ducati MotoGP bike broke off during the Qatar Grand Prix.
Miller shot into second behind Ducati stablemate and eventual race winner Andrea Dovizioso at the start, but dropped back through the field on lap two when his seat bad broke away from his GP19.
The Australian was forced to discard it and continued, but retired in the closing stages after encountering serious front tyre wear.
“It didn't want to stay on, I guess; I must have scared it,” Miller joked to BT Sport.
“I went through the fast sequence of right-handers, went through the first one sweet, was just following Dovi and settling into my rhythm.
“As I went into the corner it just went bang and broke off. So the seat is essentially glued to the subframe, but the subframe is painted, so it was glued on top of the paint.
“The paint broke off, so the seat broke off.”
Miller says the laps afterwards were “out of control” as he struggled for purchase sat on “shining carbon fibre”, and was unable to “hang off the bike” as he normally would, which ultimately led to the excessive front tyre degradation which forced him into retirement.
“It was out of control,” he added. “So the seat, the paint ripped off all at the same time. So I was on shining carbon fibre.
“There was no grip at all. So that was the biggest problem, I was just slipping and sliding around.
“I was trying to catch them back and the bike was still working rather well, but the problem was just in the corners I wasn't able to hang off the side like you normally would do.
“In corners I'm usually running 47, 48 degrees lean angle. We were on maximum lean and I felt like [five-times 500cc world champion] Mick Doohan, because every time I'd try to go to the side the bike would try to slide underneath me and I was essentially sitting on to of it.
“I was just going along for the ride, just seeing how long I could stay in with them. Then the edge of the front tyre wore out.
“I gave it too much of a hiding throughout the race, and then I started to have some big moments through the fast sector and I was thinking I'd really like to ride in Argentina and not sliding down the road getting burned."
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