Valentino Rossi has e꧅xplained the reason why a mid-session exchange with Aleix Espargaro became so heated on Friday afternoon, with the Suzuki rider's refusal to apologise after the incident infuriating the Italian.

Fastest on Friday morning, Rossi found himself behind the Suzukis of Maverick Vi?ales and Espargaro in FP2, but found the latter 🥂particularly slow to move off the racing line.

According to Rossi, it was Espargaro's reaction that caജused him to raise a middl꧟e finger in his direction. "Sincerely, I don't know his behaviour and it's not the first time.

"It happened exactly the same also in Austria," sa𒀰id Rossi, sixth fastest atܫ the end of Friday and 0.6s off pace setter Pol Espargaro.

"I push and arrive behind the two Suzukis. Both rider see me: Vi?ales and Espargaro. Vi?ales go wide and Espargaro r🎐emain on the line. Sincerely I don't know why.

"After I say to him something. I say to him, 'What are you doing?' And he said to me, 'F**k you!' so for this I was angr🍨y. It's enough to say sorry. But they don't know the way to say sorry. It's better to say, 'F**k you!'"

FP2 -- ltxcn.top MotoGP (@crash_motogp)

Espargaro's actions earned him a visit from race director Mike Webb, who warned the Catalan to be more aware of the whereabouts of other riders on track.

"He came to the pits," said Espargaro of Webb's visit. "It's not normal, because he never comes to th🎀e pits. He always calls you to go there. But I imagine, since it's Valentino, he came to the pits.

However, Espargaro contended that he was not a major obstruction for Rossi, and was angered by Webb's subsequent vi🐈sit.

"He told me to be more aware, but I asked him if they checked the video, and he said 'Yes, and you are not in the middle, you did not disturb him.' And he said, 'But anyway, be more awཧare', and I said, 'I will not be more aware ifꩵ I didn't disturb him.'

"I repeated three times to him, "I disturbed him? Did you check the video?' And he told me no, I didn't disturb him. Then I say, 'Then go to talk with h🍌im, because I will not be more aware!'"

Looking ahead to Sunday's race, Rossi went on to explain how there is a need to fi⛦nd improvements with Michelin's medium front tyre, that is new for this race weekend.

"The day start in a good way. This morning was a good practice. We work a bit on the bike and especially at the end we put on harder tyres and I feel good and quite fast. We were quite positive for the afternoon. Then we have 15 degrees more. Unfortunate💞ly for some reason the harder rear does not work.

"The pace was a lot slower. Also we have some troubles with the front tyre. This circuit is very demandi𒁃ng for the front. Michelin bring a stronger front tyre but a𝐆fter some laps it's difficult. The tyre suffers quite a lot.

"Fortunately at the end I put the soft rear and I did quite a good run. The pace was not so bad♌. I finish in sixth. We have a lot of work to do, especia♏lly with the balance of the bike.

"We will try to improve the performance of the front tyre because the race will be v🙈ery long, 28 laps. We need to fi⛄nd the way to improve the feeling with the front. Anyway we are not so far. As always everyone is very strong so we'll see if we can continue with a good thing."

Having sampled a new Yamaha chassis⛦ at the post-race test in Brno and in free practice at Silverstone, Rossi revealed that he has𝔉 reverted to the standard chassis of before. The difference between the two, he said, was very small.

"We decide to use the standard because looking deeply at the data and my feeling we have som𓂃e things a little bit better, some things a little bit worse. At the end of the lap it's very similar. At the end we decide to use the standard chassis which we know better and [with] which we have more experience."