Lorenzo puzzled by Puig 'risk' comments
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Jorge Lorenzo says the ‘huge es’ and injuries he has suffered this season prove how hard he has been pushing at Repsol Honda.The triple premier-class champion is yet to take a top ten finish on the RCV and some recent quotes from team manager Alberto Puig (in Spanish) suggested Lorenzo has to take more risks and that it’s not a question of technique, but courage and willingness.”Well, he’s the boss and a person that I have a lot of respect for because I think he knows about bikes and this [MotoGP] world,” responded Lorenzo, speaking in the Misano paddock on Thursday.”But [how] anybody can tell that I didn’t try and didn’t take risks with this bike – because I have huge es, always because I wanted to try to get good results.”Probably that was the problem. I pushed maybe too much before knowing exactly the bike and that’s why I ed and I got injured and this made everything much more difficult.”Because everything [comes] from the injuries. Without the injuries I’m sure I would be able to, maybe not win races, but finish sometimes in the podium and in the top five.”Lorenzo’s most recent injury was also his most severe since joining Honda; the Spaniard being sidelined for two months after fractures to his vertebrae at Assen.Asked to compare his current situation with that of his first season at Ducati, Lorenzo replied:”I struggled also in the first year at Ducati, but I’ve struggled more this time because before the season started, I had two big injuries last year, in Aragon in the foot and Thailand with the wrist.”Then in the pre-season I broke my scaphoid. In Qatar I broke some ribs and the big one was in Assen. I’ve never been 100% fit to ride the Honda, so I could never push to my maximum.”So like this in MotoGP is difficult, even more when you don’t feel completely comfortable on the bike, that’s the feeling I’ve got with the Honda for the moment.”I’ve never felt really safe, especially in the front part of the bike. It’s all the circumstances together, especially the injuries, that make my situation or my results so bad.””4Lorenzo qualified 21st and finished 14th on his return to action at Silverstone, then withdrew after just half-a-day of the Misano test due to pain from the injury.”I could have stayed and finished the test, it was a possibility,” he said. “But after the Silverstone race, the injury was inflamed and I felt even more pain than before Silverstone.”So there was no meaning to keep pushing the injury because it was just a test. I was riding about three-seconds slower than the fastest times and for the team and for me there was no meaning to keep testing. That’s why we decided not to push the injury more and recover as much as possible for this weekend.”The good news is that the fractures are “solid, so this gives me calmness to ride. But until I get on the bike and see how I feel I will not know. I’m good, I’m better but not perfect. I think it requires more time to recover from this injury.”Given the off-pace weekend at Silverstone, did Lorenzo return to action too early?”That’s the rider mentality, no? We know the history of MotoGP riders and I’ve made even crazier things in the past,” he said. “I was two months out of competition, sooner or later I needed to come back.”For me it was too soon at Brno, too soon in Austria but in (Silverstone) I could ride like I did. Yes, very slow and very far from the fastest but I felt it was the moment to come back to get some pace and some rhythm, because after three months out of the bike would be too much.”Lorenzo set pole position for Ducati at Misano last season, but fell from second place late in the race.
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