Aprilia awaits Bagnaia: "Ready for a new challenge"

Aprilia closed the first part of the MotoGP championship with Jorge Martin leading the riders’ standings. Marco Bezzecchi led the World Championship for much of the season, then after his crash at the start in Hungary, a decidedly unlucky period began. The Noale-based manufacturer is targeting the world title, knowing that Marc Marquez will be a tough nut to crack. And from 2027 it will be able to count on another pupil of Valentino Rossi’s Academy: Pecco Bagnaia.

Fabiano Sterlacchini, technical director of Aprilia Racing, is one of the architects of the Veneto manufacturer’s turnaround in MotoGP. After years at the back of the grid, the RS-GP has become one of the most competitive bikes, capable of giving Ducati a hard time. Performance and speed aren’t enough; you need consistency of results and that pinch of luck that never hurts. “It’s been a fantastic first part of the season. Our performance improved significantly in the second half of last year. We confirmed, in terms of performance, the growth of the package at the start of this championship.”

To sit on the MotoGP world throne, a good bike isn’t always enough. You need a rider capable of managing it and taking it to victory, race after race. “Once you have a good bike, you have to push the rider to try to ride it perfectly,” Sterlacchini added to the official MotoGP website. “And sometimes it happens that you have a rider who knows how to interpret one part of the bike perfectly, but not as well with another. And conversely, there are other riders who, for example, are good at all the other parts of the bike, but in that area where the previous section was good, they are not as strong.”

The secret of success lies in the perfect bike-rider mix. In the first part of this championship, the Aprilia RS-GP seemed to have something extra compared to its rivals, but there’s a bit of a bitter taste left from Bezzecchi’s recent setbacks, between crashes, penalties, and the recent injury. On their side, the engineers will continue to evolve the prototype, especially the front end, which still has room for improvement at the moment.

In Noale they’re not only thinking about the current year, but also about 2027, when there will be many new elements to manage. Both regarding the MotoGP regulations and the introduction of Pirelli tires, as well as the arrival of Pecco Bagnaia, who will replace Martin. A strong market move bearing Rivola’s signature. “Our secret is our best negotiator, Massimo,” Fabiano Sterlacchini emphasized. “He’s really good at convincing people to believe in the project. Also, it’s very easy to trust Pecco because, after all, he’s a three-time world champion. He’s going through a tough moment. He’s not in the same fantastic form as in 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024, but that’s normal. Sometimes it happens in this sport. The important thing is to find new energy with a new project and start tackling another challenge in your life.”

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