Source: Supplied.

Multi-time world champion Jorge Lorenzo has suffered a disappointing start to his 2018 MotoGP World Championship assault after a technical issue with his front brake ultimately resulted in crashing, ruling him out of the weekend’s season-opener in Qatar.

Lorenzo, who started on the third row, says he knew there was an issue in the early stages of the 22-lap outing, although after managing the situation to the halfway point, he was unable to stop when attempting a pass on Team Suzuki Ecstar’s Andrea Iannone.

“It wasn’t one of the best weekends for me,” Lorenzo emphasised. “I had a lot of problems and my crash was the result of a problem with the front brakes. Already on lap two I realised that something wasn’t right and I tried to manage the situation, but the problem was getting worse.

“I thought it was an overheating problem, but when I was about to catch Iannone I wasn’t able to stop the bike and I tipped myself off to avoid worse damage. Now we have to understand what exactly happened to prevent the same problem from repeating itself in the future. It’s a pity because I was lapping with good times and I think I could have got closer to the leading group.”

The DNF comes after a challenging debut season in 2017 with Ducati, marking an unfortunate beginning to making amends in the new season. The Spaniard will now regroup ahead of the second round in Argentina on 8 April.