MOTOGP: Rossi avoided 'disaster' with Lorenzo

Valentino Rossi said he decided to go off track in his Aragon Grand Prix battle with Jorge Lorenzo to avoid the potential "disaster" of a collision with his MotoGP teammate.

The Yamaha riders – who argued after the last race at Misano about Rossi's pass on Lorenzo – were fighting for second in the closing laps when Rossi outbraked himself at Turn 11. The Italian dived to the inside of the track, passing Lorenzo but heading straight on and into the run-off area, ending the fight two laps from home.

"I gave the maximum, but Lorenzo in the second half of the race was stronger," said Rossi, who recovered to finish third. "He overtook me and got in front, but I was still there.

"From behind I could stay with him, and I wanted to try to make the fight on the last lap but unfortunately I did a mistake in braking.

"I braked, it was a little bit too fast and it was too dangerous so I decided to cut the corner and go wide [on the exit]. If not we can touch or it is a disaster."

Lorenzo believes he was lucky that Rossi made the mistake, as he knew he would not have been able to pull away from his teammate before the finish.

"When I passed Rossi I started to lose the pace, so Rossi was able to stay behind me and I knew he wanted to try on the last lap," said Lorenzo. "I was lucky this time he made the mistake under braking, because I'm sure our fight would last until the last corner."

Lorenzo said he had fun in the early laps where an eight-rider battle developed at the front, and Marquez apologized for misjudging an aggressive pass on his fellow Spaniard on the opening lap.

Explaining why he held his hand up exiting Turn 15 after lunging past Lorenzo, Marquez said: "It was the first lap, and it was the first overtake in Turn 15, which was a strong point for me.

"I didn't calculate well and it was a little bit too tight for the first lap. So I said 'excuse me' but fortunately nothing happened."

Originally on Autosport.com