Aprilia Scores a Triple, but Has a “Problem”: The Fastest Rider Is Not a Factory Rider

Aprilia’s factory riders are chasing Trackhouse team rider number 25, Friday’s leader at Mandalika: they must finish ahead of him and avoid handing Marquez any gifts.

Everyone expected Aprilia to be strong in Indonesia, and that proved to be the case, at least during the first two MotoGP practice sessions. Friday ended with three RS-GP26s occupying the top three places in the standings. But the best of them all was not a factory team rider, but Raul Fernandez: the Madrid-born rider from satellite team SuperFile Trackhouse set a new lap record at the Mandalika International Circuit, finishing 0.219 seconds ahead of Marco Bezzecchi and 0.481 seconds ahead of Jorge Martin.

After a few somewhat subdued Grands Prix, Fernandez has bounced back and put himself forward as one of the main protagonists of the MotoGP weekend. His factory-team colleagues must find a way to improve and finish ahead of him, especially since they need to gain as many points as possible over Marc Marquez in Indonesia, given that Ducati appears to have less to offer than Aprilia. In the title race, the round on the island of Lombok represents an opportunity to be seized, as the RS-GP26 is the best bike.

Bezzecchi considers his day a positive one, but at the same time would like to be performing at a higher level and identified the fourth sector as the area to improve: "We started well in FP1 and continued positively in the afternoon. Raul was incredibly fast, especially in terms of pace on the soft tyre; we need to understand where he is making the difference. I think he is strong especially in sector 4; I’ll look at the data to see whether I’m doing something wrong. This weekend has started a little better than the previous ones, but I’m still not as fast as I would like to be. I need to keep working to find the confidence I want. It’s a matter of time; I need to stay calm and believe in myself".

Although third place does not seem like a bad result, Martin also feels that he has greater potential than he showed today and expects to make progress during the rest of the weekend: "Overall, it was a good day, even if I expected the afternoon to go a little better. I was highly competitive in the morning, then I struggled a little more. I had some problems with the front tyre during the first part of Practice: we tried making a few changes to the bike, but when I fitted a new front tyre everything returned to normal. I was fast, but I have more potential. I didn’t ride here with Aprilia last year, so it’s normal to struggle a little. I think I’ll be able to make a step forward by Saturday. Raul seems to be on another planet at the moment, but it’s positive to have his data available to analyse so we can close the gap to him".

Aprilia’s factory riders expect to obtain useful information from the data coming from the Trackhouse garage. Marquez is not looking bad in terms of race pace, so they need to make progress to feel more "certain" that they can beat him in the weekend’s races. Fernandez could become an ally for Martin and Bezzecchi, but he could also be an ally of Marquez himself if he takes points away from the Noale team pairing.

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