John McPhee’s Qatar Moto3 unfortunately came to an abrupt and early end on Sunday, after he was taken out by Xavier Artigas on the third lap.

Feeling confident as he lined up alongside his Petronas teammate Darryn Binder on the front row, McPhee was travelling in fourth as he advanced on the opening lap’s first corner. The Scot soon recovered and was back in third as the lap unfolded, pushing hard and staying with the leading group.

Briefly taking second on the next revolution as he jostled for position with both Binder and a bunch of KTM’s, the number 17’s first race of the year was brought to an early conclusion as rookie Artigas slid out at turn six, collecting the Scot and two other riders in the process, after just three laps of action.

“My race ended early after I was hit by another rider,” McPhee explained after getting his bruised left ankle checked out on Sunday evening.

“I’ll accept it for what it is, but we know where we are fast and we’ll keep working hard until the race next week. I felt good at the start of the race and in the first laps, it felt quite easy to stay within the front pack. It’s a shame for the race to finish so early due to someone else’s mistake, but it is what it is and we’ll come back fighting next week.

“The race pace to be honest, was actually not that fast. Obviously the wind played a big part in that. I saw on the grid, there was only five or six of us with the soft tyre, so I was thinking ‘Okay, this can really play into my hands here’ - because I’ve been really strong with the used tyre, especially when we’re doing a long run.

“I was thinking ‘first lap, save the tyre’, I actually felt really calm. Everything was under control and then obviously it was out of my control that I got taken out, so it was a one of these things, accept it for what it is and move on to next week.

“Working with Darryn is brilliant, First of all, congrats to Darryn today because that was mega! Good way to start the year, and through practice and qualifying we’ve been helping each other. I’ve been able to help him, he’s been helping me, so it’s been good and I think throughout the year that’s going to be a big advantage.

“We’re seeing so many teams now that are doing that and the ones who are able to make it work good, it’s working really well, so we’ll continue working exactly the same and give ourselves another crack at it next week.”

With the second of the back-to-back races at Losail already on the Scotsman’s mind, is he planning on making any changes in preparation for next weekend?

“I think we’ll just approach it in the exact same way” he explained. “We had the package, the setup and everything today to fight at the front and I felt confident. I still do, even for next week, so we’ll just rest and recover a little bit over these next couple of days and then come back into next weekend, and start our season off.”

Despite the untimely end, McPhee’s team boss, Johan Stigefelt seemed reasonably pleased with the weekend overall, concluding “it was a very tough race but it was so good to see both riders starting from the front row, they’ve done a good job all weekend.

“Today the wind picked up so it was difficult for the guys to find a good gearing for the race, but they managed it. Unfortunately for John he was taken out in Turn 6 and there was nothing he could do about it. It’s a shame for him and for the team because he had good speed today.”