Lorenzo: Misano 2017 MotoGP crash maybe cost me Ducati future

Lorenzo spent nine years at Yamaha between 2008 and 2016, winning all three of his premier class world titles on the M1, before departing for Ducati on a two-year deal in 2017.

A largely difficult debut campaign on the Desmosedici yielded just three podiums, while he was on course for victory at a wet Misano before crashing out.

Lorenzo would go onto win three races in a 2018 curtailed by injury, though a disappointing start to that season led Ducati to drop him in favour of Danilo Petrucci, while Lorenzo wound up signing an ill-fated deal with Honda.

Reflecting on his time with Ducati, Lorenzo believes a different outcome at Misano in 2017 may have saved his career with the Italian marque, and thinks he could have fought Marc Marquez for last year's world title had he been on a GP19.

"With Ducati, you know the story," Lorenzo told Sky Italia.

"They had invested a lot in me, I had won three [premier-class] world championships and I was worth the financial effort.

"After a year-and-a-half, we still hadn't won a race. If I had won at Misano [in 2017], maybe the story would have changed.

"They came up with financial reasons, Petrucci would have cost less and he was Italian.

"Too bad, because there was no patience to wait and maybe everything was decided too soon.

"At that moment we found the thing that allowed us to win, but it was too late. In 2019 we could have fought for the championship."

Lorenzo's sole year on the Honda in 2019 proved disastrous, with injury and a loss of motivation caused by difficulties in adapting to the RC213V leading him to retire from racing at the end of the season.

He remains a part of the MotoGP paddock still, however, after agreeing a deal to return to Yamaha as its official test rider.

Lorenzo took part in one day of the Sepang shakedown and one day of the official test at the Malaysia GP venue, riding a 2019 M1, and was due to test in Motegi this month before the coronavirus pandemic forced him into lockdown in Dubai.

Yamaha boss Massimo Meregalli told Autosport that the Japanese marque had asked him to base himself in Dubai to be able to avoid the lockdowns in his native Spain to be able to ride in the test - but those plans were ultimately scuppered.

Lorenzo was due to make a wildcard appearance for Yamaha at the Catalan GP in June, though this has now been - for the time being - abandoned after the Barcelona race joined the list of eight MotoGP events postponed by the COVID-19 outbreak.