Nicolo Bulega admitted he and Ducati had to start from scratch after his Superpole WorldSBK race collision with Axel Bassani at Misano.
The championship leader’s Superpole race was compromised when Bimota’s Axel Bassani lost the front at Turn 1 at the start.
As a result, Bulega’s title rival Toprak Razgatlioglu secured the Superpole race win which cut the championship gap to 14-points.
“He told me he lost his front end when he braked,” Bulega told Speedweek post-race.
“But I saw on TV afterwards that his front wheel slipped after he touched me. If he hadn’t touched me, it wouldn’t have happened.
“He didn’t have the pace to win. So why make such a stupid overtaking manoeuvre in the first corner? It was a rookie mistake.”
Bulega stated that Bassani was “looking for excuses” to avoid responsibility for the crash, claiming his fellow countryman told him that his front wheel folded under braking into the corner.
“On top of that, he didn’t come to me to apologize to me and my team—he just made an Instagram story.
“That’s not enough, also out of respect for my team, because they had to rebuild my bike. Everything was destroyed, including the chassis.
“The least he could have done would have been to apologise to me and my team.”
Nicolo Bulega: Toprak Razgatlioglu ‘was strong all weekend’
To add insult to injury, Bulega was forced to start Race 2 from 10th but fought back to finish second, but the championship gap cut further to just nine points.
However, the Italian conceded he was second-best to the reigning WorldSBK champion, who completed back-to-back trebles on the Adriatic coast.
“I haven’t had a consistently good feeling all weekend. It was good in qualifying, but not at other times. We need to understand why that was.
“Second place isn’t a bad result, but it’s my home race and my team’s, and we wanted to achieve more. Congratulations to Toprak, he was very strong all weekend.”
