Movistar Yamaha’s Jorge Lorenzo has explained his reasons for making a proper cock of his start at today’s Austin MotoGP, saying his visor was so full of bugs he deviated from his normal routine and removed a tear off while on the line.

The former world champion jumped the start by metres, knocked off his throttle but then went again as stopping would have caused a major problem. He went into the lead but was then penalised with a ride-through and came in after lap one.

“When I arrive to the grid, I have too many mosquitos On my visor so I decided to take out the tear off. I never do this and at this moment, I get confused and when I see the red light I thought it was the start of the race. It went red very late,” said Lorenzo, speaking at Austin

Lorenzo then came through from the very back of the pack to score a tenth-place finish. Given more laps, he would have caught and passed team-mate Valentino Rossi who was lapping some two seconds slower after his front tyre gave up at half distance.

“It was difficult to keep calm and not get too stressed and crazy, I have some moments into the last corner with my rear wheel in the grass. For all the confusion at the beginning, I couldn’t ride the maximum, I was nervous on the braking but by the time I relaxed, the tyre was already bad,” added Lorenzo.