Rossi perplexed by "surprise" crash

Rossi, who had started from pole, crashed while chasing after Marc Marquez for the lead of the race on lap seven, the Italian losing the front end of his bike at Turn 10.

Marquez went on to win the race and clinch the MotoGP championship with three races to spare.

"I didn't feel nothing. Usually when you crash, you feel something the moment before. But for me it was a big surprise," Rossi explained.

"I was pushing, because I was trying to catch Marc. I didn't want to catch him that lap - in fact, I didn't do anything crazy, and the splits and the laptime was very similar to the lap before.

"For sure, I was pushing, I didn't want him to escape, but I arrived there and I wasn't wide, I wasn't too fast."

Having had another front-end crash earlier in the season at Austin, Rossi insisted that the Motegi accident was very different.

"In Austin I entered [Turn 2] too tight and I had the bump. But in Austin, I felt the moment before, I said 'f**k!'. Here, when I was saying 'f**k', I was already in the gravel," he joked.

"It was a shame, because we were strong. I think, in reality, it would be difficult to beat Marc but I could stay with him, I could fight with him."

Asked how he felt in the aftermath of the race, Rossi said: "Well, time passed [since the crash] - we had a long meeting, we tried to be concentrated, to work well on the next season, but we have three races, three great tracks that I like, and we have to fight for second place with [teammate Jorge] Lorenzo.

"Maybe this night I will be more angry, but now...

"I was okay, I was concentrated, I felt good. The shame is that I didn't feel nothing, I didn't expect but it's like this."

Additional reporting by Oriol Puigdemont