Jake Dixon's Catalan Moto2 GP came to an unexpected and disheartening conclusion as a technical retirement cut his race short after just five laps of promising action.

Starting from the second row, the British rider dropped back slightly in the opening lap before regrouping and was making steady progress through the field as he successfully manoeuvred himself into sixth before disaster struck on lap five.

The Petronas rider was forced to retire from the race after the throttle cable on his bike snapped coming out of turn seven, leaving the frustrated rider and his forlorn Petronas at the side of the track at turn nine wondering what might have been.

"It was difficult because I took my time at the beginning of the race to let the bike come to me. I was able to make some moves forward, past a couple of riders. Then when eyeing up my next move, the throttle cable snapped coming out of turn seven," said Dixon.

“It’s unfortunate because I felt like I had a really good pace and I could have done a really good job today.

“It was a difficult start to the weekend with FP2, but we kept improving each day, had our best qualifying to date and we could have had our best race result too.

“There are positives to take from this weekend, but it is frustrating. It’s no one’s fault, the team couldn’t have done anything to prevent it. It’s just one of those things and my time will come.”