Aprilia's positive development in MotoGP continues, and Aleix's third place after free practice was the best example. At the end of FP3 he was only one tenth behind Andrea Dovizioso and Marc Marquez, in the fight for the world title.
Saturday afternoon was a superb confirmation of this high level of performance, with the fourth qualifying time for Espargaro, behind Johann Zarco and Danilo Petrucci, and only 0.044 from third Marc Marquez.
The race was significantly less favorable, with seventh position at the end of the first lap, and the same seventh position at the finish line, 28 seconds behind the winner. Andrea Dovizioso.
According to Alex Espargaro, “Seventh place is a good result, but our potential was better than that. To be honest, I'm disappointed. After the speed we showed throughout the weekend, our expectations were different.
“Unfortunately, I never found my rhythm in the race. I had big problems with aquaplaning which cost me a lot of ground. I don't really understand it. I even tried changing the engine map, but the situation didn't improve much.
“Towards the end of the race, when it stopped raining, I was able to do a few good laps, getting closer to the Suzukis, but then it started raining again and I had to hold on. In the final two races I want to try to get into the top ten of the Championship standings. »
For Aprilia Competition Director Romano Albesiano, who are " Aleix's result confirms us stable in the top 10 of MotoGP. This very positive weekend allowed us to show great competitiveness, both in real wet conditions and in mixed dry and wet conditions which had really penalized us in the past.
“So this is a very important sign of improvement.” In practice we did much better than in the race, which indicates that we need to improve our race management so that we can confirm on Sunday everything we can do in practice and now in qualifying. It was also a good race for Sam who did very well in these conditions and he managed to finish in the points. »
According to the team manager Fausto Gresini, « Aleix did a very good job. We can be satisfied and today Sam also demonstrated his qualities in the wet. Of course we were in the top places all weekend, but a finish like this should be considered positive because it is still in the top 10 and because our goal was to confirm the great result from Aragon.
“It is true that during the race we did not repeat our extraordinary performances from practice and qualifying, but we had slippage that we did not even have during the warm up. In any case, we fought once again with fierce rivals, leaving several behind. »
Japanese Grand Prix standings:
1 Andrea DOVIZIOSO-Ducati Team-Ducati
2 Marc MARQUEZ-Repsol Honda Team-Honda +0.249
3 Danilo PETRUCCI-OCTO Pramac Racing-Ducati +10.557
4 Andrea IANNONE-Team SUZUKI ECSTAR-Suzuki +18.845
5 Alex RINS-Team SUZUKI ECSTAR-Suzuki +22.982
6 Jorge LORENZO-Ducati Team-Ducati +24.464
7 Aleix ESPARGARO-Aprilia Racing Team Gresini-Aprilia +28.010
8 Johann ZARCO-Monster Yamaha Tech 3-Yamaha +29.475
9 Maverick VIÑALES-Movistar Yamaha MotoGP-Yamaha +36.575
10 Loris BAZ-Reale Avintia Racing-Ducati +48.506
11 Pol ESPARGARO-Red Bull KTM Factory Racing-KTM +56.357
12 Katsuyuki NAKASUGA -Yamalube Yamaha Factory Racing-Yamaha +1'00.181
13 Sam LOWES-Aprilia Racing Team Gresini-Aprilia +1'00.980
14 Hector BARBERA-Reale Avintia Racing-Ducati +1'03.118
15 Tito RABAT-EG 0,0 Marc VDS-Honda +1'03.514
16 Scott REDDING-OCTO Pramac Racing-Ducati +1'04.162
17 Bradley SMITH-Red Bull KTM Factory Racing-KTM +1'06.271
18 Hiroshi AOYAMA-EG 0,0 Marc VDS-Honda +1'13.250
Provisional ranking of the World Championship:
1 Marc MARQUEZ-Honda 244 points
2 Andrea DOVIZIOSO-Ducati 233
3 Maverick VIÑALES-Yamaha 203
4 Dani PEDROSA-Honda 170
5 Valentino ROSSI-Yamaha 168
6 Johann ZARCO-Yamaha 125
7 Jorge LORENZO-Ducati 116
8 Danilo PETRUCCI-Ducati 111
9 Cal CRUTCHLOW-Honda 92
10 Jonas FOLGER-Yamaha 84
11 Alvaro BAUTISTA-Ducati 70
12 Aleix ESPARGARO-Aprilia 62
13 Jack MILLER-Honda 56
14 Scott REDDING-Ducati 56
15 Andrea IANNONE-Suzuki 50
16 Loris BAZ-Ducati 45
Photos © Gresini Aprilia Racing
