Miller: Bautista shove down to "built-up frustration"

The Marc VDS Honda rider qualified 10th at Jerez, his best result in a dry qualifying session, but his race only lasted until a Turn 1 collision with Bautista on lap six.

It ended Miller’s run of top-10 finishes to start the season, and he pushed Bautista and kicked the Spaniard’s Aspar Ducati in the gravel trap in the immediate aftermath.

Having spoken with Bautista when they both returned to pitlane, Miller said his actions were also influenced by getting “caught up in shit” at Turn 1 in the opening laps.

“I lost so much time in the first two or three laps just with people lunging from six kilometres back and they don’t even make the corner,” he said.

“The problem is here you know you have this run off, this asphalt so they can still turn and they come back and then they go for it two laps later.

“It was a pain in the arse with that in the first three laps and the gap that I had and then I was closing to [Andrea] Dovizioso.

“Then it happened again with [Danilo] Petrucci, he did the same thing but was able to get passed.

“And then me and him were going and then Bautista tried the same thing in Turn 1 and took me out with him.

“I mean, there was no way he was going to stop the bike there at Turn 1.

“He came in hot, his bike was still going [straight ahead], I was already halfway into the corner and then he lost the front and just cleaned me out.

“And then I pushed him, it’s not the right thing to do. It was just built-up frustration.

“It happened three times already that I got completely pushed off the end of the track with somebody else when my braking marker was correct.”

Miller said he was informed by officials that he will receive a €1000 fine for pushing Bautista.

In his third MotoGP season, and out of contract with Honda at the end of the year, Miller said Bautista’s experience - in his eighth campaign - added to his frustration.

“I had [Jonas] Folger and a few others do it to me but, I mean, Folger’s a rookie and here is a hard track for the first time you race here - with the full [fuel] load and everything.

“It is a hard place to stop the bike but, I mean, the likes of Bautista have been here longer than I have been riding a road bike so he should know better.”