Monster Yamaha's Valentino Rossi crashed out of his second MotoGP on the bounce in Catalunya but believes he was on target for at least a podium finish if not the win.

The Italian, who has slipped to 11th in the title chase, hasn't completely written off his title chances although they are now more mathematical than anything else.

“In order not to despair, we have to think that it was a good weekend anyway, that I rode well, that I enjoyed myself and I could play for the win,” said Rossi, speaking at the track.

"We are following a very interesting road with the setting of the bike, so even if the championship is closed for me, there are great reasons to be fast from now to the end of the year. As long as the math doesn't say it, it's not over.

“Unfortunately, I have already made three zeroes and I fell twice in a row due to my mistakes, and the bike broke down in the first race, so it's difficult. But there are still many races and we will have to try to be fast, if I can ride like this, I can go fast on all sides.

“We start very, very smooth at the beginning, we had a good pace and I tried to ride very sweet on the front and rear tyre, because I know like everybody at the end of the race we will suffer.

"But anyway, we had a very good pace and we stayed at front, but I don’t push too much there. Franco did a mistake at turn one, so from that moment I push because I don’t want to take too much disadvantage to Fabio.

“I wanted to try and stay close to him because I know especially Suzukis at the end are very strong. But I did a mistake. So, looking at the data it’s a really, really similar to the lap before but with this temperature I need to pay more attention on the left.”