ROUND 10

Donington Park, Britain

I had this huge crash in practice, on a cold tyre, going down through Craner. They’d put new gravel beds there – it was like hitting a pavement kerb. I sat in the garage for the rest of the session. Back then every session was qualifying, so my guys are going: “It’s supposed to rain tomorrow – you need to get out there and get in a good lap”. I was so concussed that I sat in the garage and for the life of me I couldn’t think which way to go when I left the garage.

Then Wayne had a big crash in practice, but I didn’t know how beat up he was. I out-qualified the field by a full second, then the Mick thing happened [a first-lap pile-up caused by Doohan]. I should have been badly hurt; it could’ve been the end of my season. I was getting attention when the race ended and all the Italian doctors were getting excited because Luca [Cadalora] had beaten Wayne. That’s when I knew something wasn’t right with him, because either him or me had pretty much cleared off at every British GP since ’88. I’d gone to Donington with a 23-point lead and I left with a three-point lead.