Bagnaia went into last weekend’s Malaysian MotoGP with a 13 point lead before gaining a total o🎶f one point over Jorge Martin.

The factory Ducati rider lost out to his title ri🍃val in the sprint butඣ was able to hold off the Spaniard during the early stages of the race, before stretching clear of Martin. 

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Bagnaia, who r൩egained his one lap speed after taking pole for the first time since round 11 in Barcelona, was p🍨leased to be back where he feels he belongs. 

“Satis📖fied with the work but not completely with the result,” began Bagnaia. “I prefer to be more in front but we have to be happy. Wꦫe closed the weekend with one point more than we started and the feeling was back. I was able to push from the start and make the pole position. 

“Everything went well apart from the sprint where I started to have an issue with the front which was giving lots of chattering. I wa🍌s no🥂t happy about that but today [Sunday] was good. 

“The battle with Jorge was good and we managed to open the gaওp with him. I tried everything to close the gap to th💧e top two but I was struggling with the front, I was having a strange feeling. 

“I was having a lot of locking anওd a lot of 🔜movement. It was very risky to close this gap.”

Bagnaia was well clear of Martin come the end of the race despite the pair battling hard early on, but for the Ital🌠ian, be𒈔ating Martin held a greater importance than just that of the final position.

Bagnaia said: “Cons꧃idering the pace we had after this battle we can be happy. My pace was stronger and maybe we were more competitive than him today. This is important. 

“This was the first time that we were more comp🀅etitive than him in many races. I’m happy with that and with the feeling with the bike.”

With reg💖ards to the title, Bagnaia was on a three-race losing streak to Martin in terms of points prior to finishing third at Sepang.

But although 14 points is a good lead at this stage of the season - only two rounds (four races remain) - it’s not one he feels totally secure with: “Having that will be very important to open the gap more. 14 points is good but it’s nowher🧸e near enough. 

“I’m very happy that Enea [Bastianini] was back on this [lev💜el] of performance and it will help to improve. I’m looking forward to going to Qatar.”