With the exception of the unfortunate Oliveira, the Aprilia riders all experienced serious difficulties due to the heat in Thailand. A worrying point.
About Diane Tamantini de Motoracing
Le Thailand Grand Prix, in addition to the incredible battle for victory, ended on a worrying note. You have to watch Aprilia, with two drivers abandoning and two reaching the finish line exhausted. Except for the unfortunate Olive tree (the white smoke at the back of RS-GP #88 says it all), the other three were in difficulty for a pretty serious reason. In addition to the heat in Buriram, they also had to fight against the heat emitted by their Aprilia, a not new problem which, in some GPs, increasingly affects not only the performance, but above all the condition and clarity of the drivers in the race. In India, the situation was the same, Malaysia looms on the horizon and a new odyssey is to be feared.
The only two pilots Aprilia to have crossed the finish line took part in a real survival race. The first to report it was Aleix Espargaró, fifth at the finish but with great difficulty: the Spaniard said he had a lot of trouble breathing about halfway to the finish line. The reason ? The very high temperatures of its Aprilia, with the heat coming out of the motorcycle and which complicated the life of the pilot of 34 years. And we are talking about a category of highly trained athletes…” In the last five laps I was panicking, trying to fill my lungs and I couldn't, I was choking » admitted Espargaró at the end of the race.
« On the Aprilia, I started feeling nauseous after 12 laps, I couldn't breathe, I was seeing double and I had cold sweats »
An isolated case ? Absolutely not : Raul Fernandez, the second pilot Aprilia to cross the finish line, experienced exactly the same difficulties. “ I felt good with the KTM, in fact I feel better physically at high temperatures. » A completely different matter with the RS-GP. “ This is not the first time, this has also happened in India, but this time it was impossible“, recognized the standard-bearer of the RNF. “ I started feeling nauseous after 12 rounds: I couldn't breathe, I was seeing double and I was in a cold sweat. It was like running with 50° in your helmet. Has Aprilia tried to fix this? “ They made an air pipe, but it does not work and we lost speed."
So thatI will espargaro et Fernandez took a lot of risks to complete the race, Maverick Vinales understood that the situation was unmanageable and decided to stop well before the end. Always the same: the heat coming out of theAprilia and therefore the physical problems that result. “ It was incredibly hot », he says at the end of the race in Buriram. “ In 2-3 rounds, we can say that I couldn't breathe anymore, so I chose to stop because there was no point in continuing. » Unfortunately, this is not new to Aprilia, as also confirmed by Viñales, who does not have too many problems even for Malaysia. “ If that doesn't change, I won't finish the race there either » he decided.
