LCR Honda rider Cal Crutchlow labelled his performance in the British Grand Prix at Silverstone ‘disastrous’ as he took the chequered flag 19 seconds down on winner Alex Rins.
The Briton had work to do after only managing ninth in qualifying after he crashed at Stowe on his final flyer in Q2, but he “expected to be in the podium battle” come race day.
He quickly made progress from ninth to sixth at the start-helped by the elimination of Fabio Quartararo and Andrea Dovizioso in their lap one crash- but struggled to keep up with the pace of the top five afterwards, instead having to fight for sixth with Pramac Ducati’s Jack Miller.
Crutchlow ultimately prevailed in this battle and secured sixth just ahead of a charging Danilo Petrucci, albeit over 19 seconds down on the race winning Suzuki of Rins.
“To finish 19 seconds off the win here is unacceptable, not from me or the team, we tried our best this weekend and we had pace, there’s no doubt about that,” said Crutchlow.
“It’s disastrous for me, I don’t come here to finish sixth or eighth I come here to battle and this is a place I can battle at and we’ve got a package capable of allowing me to battle we just never had the tyres.
“It just wasn’t there today, but to qualify ninth and finish sixth isn’t great as I expected to be in the podium battle but it’s been a great weekend with the support I’ve had and that’s all I could do.”
Three-time MotoGP winner Crutchlow reckoned his lack of speed stemmed from a tyre issue, due to his lack of pace in the race relative to the times he was able to acheive in practice.
“I lost on every lap. I tried my best at the start to be able to push but I never had the tyre under me, something happened with the tyre immediately in the race and I knew it was impossible to compete with the other guys, something similar to what happened at Mugello.
“In FP4 yesterday we were able to go 1.5 seconds quicker than I could go at the end of the race. (Danilo) Petrucci behind was going 1.5 seconds faster than both me and Jack (Miller).
“I don’t know why but I pushed as hard as I could and even until the end I managed to pass Jack despite having to check the front tyre as I nearly went down three times at the last corner.
“It’s strange how some tyres were fine and some were a disaster, don’t get me wrong I don’t think I would’ve won the race but we should have been a lot closer and potentially maybe between (Maverick) Vinales and (Valentino) Rossi but it was impossible with what I had under me today.”
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