You don’t have to sell the bear’s skin before hunting it and although Aprilia and its two official riders are, right now, the main candidates for the title, we are seeing small “green shoots” in recent weekends. Some already arrived in Jerez, where Aprilia lost its first GP of the season, which is said to be early, but especially after the subsequent tests.
There it seems that all the brands have found something that has made them come closer to those from Noale, although we must not lose sight of the fact that in France they once again swept with Martín winning both races of the weekend, Bezzecchi on the podium both on Saturday and Sunday and Ogura completing a 100% Aprilia top3 for the first time in history.
But then the Catalonia GP arrived and again it happened a bit like Jerez, that the officials have saved the furniture as best they could in the case of Bezzecchi and that Martín, faster, made a mistake on Saturday and on Sunday he was beginning to lose distance from the heads of Acosta and Márquez before the fall with which the red flag was shown. On the second restart, the contact with Fernández deprived us of seeing how far he could go, but with that strange feeling that it was more the Madrid native and his feeling with the track than such a manifest superiority of the Aprilia.
And the point is not that the Aprilia does not perform well, it is that there are tracks where the rest of the brands seem to adapt better. At first it seemed that Jerez and its peculiarities would have something to do with it, but the Circuit is very different and, even so, they didn’t go so well. What’s more, Raúl Fernández was the fastest in Q2 with a fourth place while Martín was ninth and Bezzecchi twelfth.
Is Aprilia that dominant?
That’s the big question right now and it’s not easy to answer. On the one hand there is always the human factor and on the other the brand’s ability to offer the best technical package at all times. A technical package that is at an incredible level because the engine and electronics work and then the bike turns like a delight. To this we must add the aerodynamic package, perhaps the most elaborate on the grid and on which they continue to work. And in the tests this Monday in Montmeló, where by the way Martín had to go to the hospital after a fall in which he did not suffer fractures, they were working on aerodynamics and set-up.
The curious thing in this case is that Aprilia runs the risk that each change will, paradoxically, make the bike run worse. And while we have KTM improving rapidly. The GP eluded Acosta and so did the podium, but he has been chasing it all season and the Austrians have been improving. So much so that in addition to Pedro’s pole, Binder was eighth. But even more interesting are the tests after the GP where Pedro was seven tenths off his best time to be the fastest of the day, interrupted by the weather conditions, with Bastianini third and Viñales, who returned to the MotoGP on Friday after the operation, fourth and all of them separated by less than two tenths. This means that the package is becoming more and more competitive.
As Ducati’s also sometimes seems to be. Without a doubt in Jerez it was and Montmeló too, in Le Mans “comme ci, comme ça” although, in any case it seems that they are solving the problems by testing new components such as the swingarm that they have already taken to the track this weekend and that Bagnaia tested again on Monday.
And then we have the two brands that are furthest, for now, from Aprilia. These are Yamaha and Honda. In the case of the seconds, the golden wing drivers seem to be being more competitive and, in fact, the injured Zarco had been pulling out his claws for several GPs and so had Joan Mir who, before being sanctioned for the fatally managed pressure rule, had climbed onto the podium. It seems that it is only a matter of all the elements aligning so that they can take the next step that, each time, seems shorter.
Meanwhile, Yamaha is also evolving. Or, well, at least if you look at Fabio Quarataro. The Frenchman, who started the season crying out for a correction for his statements, has lowered his head and got his act together again. And that is noticeable on the track as much or more than the changes that they already tested in the Jerez tests and the aerodynamic solutions that they worked on on Monday at the Circuit de Catalunya where he finished second, 64 thousandths behind Acosta.
As we see, the dance continues and no one has yet handed over the spoon. There is a desire to fight and there is a lot of World Cup ahead. If we add to this that, we saw last Sunday, in racing everything is possible for better or worse, we have a championship, a lot of championship ahead of us and Aprilia is in charge now, but will it get to Valencia doing it? We’ll see.
