A relieved Valentino Rossi says he was “very lucky” to escape serious injury after being missed by the bikes of Johann Zarco and Franco Morbidelli in the Austrian grand prix.
Rossi as running in fifth at the Red Bull Ring and just entering Turn 3 a few seconds up the road from the battling Zarco and Morbidelli as the pair collided on entry to the bend, causing both to go down while their bikes continued at unabated speed towards the unsuspecting Rossi and team-mate Maverick Vinales.
Morbidelli’s Petronas SRT M1 dug in to the grass on the inside of Turn 3 took off, flying across the track ahead of Rossi and missing the Italian by just mere inches.
Zarco’s machine meanwhile collected one of the air fences further inside the circuit and flew over the top of Vinales, before missing Rossi by an even closer margin to that of Morbidelli’s machine just fractions of a second earlier.
Rossi looked visibly shaken after returning to the pits in the ensuing red flag period, but added that learning from accidents such of these is “important” in order to improve rider safety in the future.
“Yes it was very very scary (red flag incident) for all four riders but especially for me and Maverick (Vinales), we were very lucky and we have to pray for somebody tonight,” said Rossi following the Austrian GP.
“The situation was very dangerous and I think it’s good to be aggressive for sure because everyone’s tries at the maximum, but for me we don’t have to exaggerate because we need to remember this sport is extremely dangerous.
“You need to have respect for your fellow riders, especially at tracks where you reach 300kph.
“I’ve already spoken with (Johann) Zarco who told me he didn’t cause the crash on purpose, he went very wide on braking and then shut the door in front of Franco (Morbidelli) and with this bike at 300kph you have the slipstream so Franco didn’t have any chance to brake.
“Further down the road me and Maverick were just entering Turn 3 and I felt something arrive, I thought it was the shadow of the helicopter but then Franco’s bike arrived at incredible speed as well as Zarco’s bike which jumped over Vinales so we were very lucky.
“These kinds of incidents are very important to try and improve the behaviour of riders on track in the future.”
Rossi added that he found it “difficult” to venture back onto the Austrian tarmac for the restart, but that he was satisfied to take the chequered flag as the highest-placed Yamaha in fifth despite the M1’s straight line struggles at the predominantly power-based Red Bull Ring layout.
“It was difficult to restart sincerely, but I didn’t have a lot of choice,” explained Rossi.
“When the race restarted it was good, it was not easy for us on the Yamaha here due to our lack of top speed so it was very difficult to fight with other bikes but I had a good pace.
“Unfortunately I had a very aggressive overtake by (Brad )Binder at Turn 9 that pushed me out of the track and we lost a lot of time and therefore the first group, but afterwards I still had quite a good rhythm and I could finish fifth.
“I think we could have done better but it was still a good race.”
