Valentino Rossi was making no apologies for his minor mistake late in Sunday's Chinese Grand Prix, which handed victory to championship leader Casey Stoner.
As at round one in Qatar, where the pair had also battled, Rossi's Yamaha was blown away by the Ducati along the straights - with Shanghai's enormous 1200m back stretch suiting Stoner's Desmosedici perfectly.
However, in terms of overall lap time the pair were all but equal; Rossi closing the gap through the twisty sections, where he frequently passed Stoner, but then losing any ground gained down the straight.
The pressure of battling so closely with Rossi has caused many an opponent to crack in the past. But Stoner was rock solid and a thrilling showdown looked in store until the Italian missed his braking point into the hairpin on lap 16 of 22. That let Suzuki's John Hopkins into second and by the time Rossi retook the runner-up position Stoner was out of reach.
"I enjoyed today a lot, it was a great race, a really exciting battle and my Yamaha was fantastic to the end," claimed Rossi, now 15 points behind Stoner. "We knew that this track would be difficult for us so to be able to fight with Stoner at 100% for the entire race was a great feeling. Of course it's not a win, but I think second place is a very good result for us here.
"I didn't want to give up and just ride for second, I wanted to try to pass him and I made some good overtaking manoeuvres but wasn't able to stay in front down the straight. Then I made a mistake when I hit a bump when braking, had to release the brake and ran off track. It was a pity, but when you're riding on the limit lap after lap then things like this can happen; that's racing!
"Anyway I knew I couldn't give up, I had a nice battle with John and then was able to take second. I think these 20 points are really important and we're still second in the championship. I'm really more sad for what happened in Turkey because if we hadn't had the%
