Aprilia’s Aragon Agony: Espargaro and Vinales Struggle in Embarrassing MotoGP Weekend

“Terrible” Weekend for Aprilia, “Disastrous” MotoGP Race in Aragon

Aleix Espargaro ends up trailing Marc Marquez by 40 seconds in an “embarrassing” finish, while Maverick Vinales drops out halfway through the race.

Aleix Espargaro and Maverick Vinales ended Friday's MotoGP practice session at Aragon with only Marc Marquez posting faster times.

Nonetheless, the rainfall on Friday and Saturday night left them struggling.

Initially, it seemed unusual that Espargaro and Vinales were significantly slower than Marquez's pole position time in qualifying, with gaps of 2.9 seconds and 3.7 seconds, respectively.

However, the gap was evident during the Sprint race, with Vinales ending up in 19th place, the last position, trailing Marquez by 37.6 seconds, which averages to 3.4 seconds per lap.

Espargaro, on the other hand, couldn’t make it past the first turn due to wheelspin caused by starting from the dirty side of the grid, which led to him colliding with the rear of Fabio di Giannantonio.

Participating in his final Aragon race before retiring, Espargaro managed to cross the finish line on Sunday, although he trailed Marquez by a "humiliating" 40.6 seconds, finishing in tenth position.

Espargaro expressed his frustration by saying, "I gave it my all, but nothing seemed to work, and we ended up more than 40 seconds behind the winner, which is quite humiliating. Once more, I struggled to keep myself on the bike, but at least we managed to secure a top ten finish and earn some points."

Espargaro admitted that they couldn't get the tires to function properly. He prioritized preventing crashes over achieving high performance, to the point where it was a struggle to even touch his knee to the ground.

"I wasn't able to tilt the bike during turns. This was an unfamiliar and unusual situation for us, making it difficult to come to terms with. We need to understand what went wrong."

Vinales faced an even tougher situation, as he immediately fell to the last position during the first lap on Sunday and stayed there, except for Luca Marini who started from the pit lane, until he withdrew from the race just before reaching the halfway point.

The fastest lap of the winner at COTA was 2.7 seconds slower than Marquez’s quickest lap.

"We struggled to make the tyres functional. It felt like I was on the verge of crashing at every corner, particularly due to the rear tyre," Vinales stated.

"The weekend proved challenging for both Aprilia and me. Despite a strong showing on Friday, everything seemed to fall apart afterward."

Struggling to optimize the tyres on a challenging track surface – Marquez's race-winning time was 12 seconds slower than Enea Bastianini's from two years prior – appeared to mirror past issues Aprilia faced when using slick tyres in wet conditions. "A terrible weekend," said team boss Massimo Rivola. "On Friday, we were quick despite low grip, but then we faltered, finishing around four seconds off our best times."

"This poor showing should drive us to persist with our analysis and development efforts as we prepare for the upcoming races, beginning with Misano."

Trackhouse racer Miguel Oliveira, who finished fifth in the Sprint, unfortunately crashed during the first lap of the grand prix. His teammate Raul Fernandez ended up in 16th place due to a penalty for tyre pressure.

"Today was extremely challenging," Fernandez remarked. "I'm not entirely sure what went wrong. Yesterday, I managed three laps with decent traction, but then I experienced significant tyre graining. However, today, I had no grip at all."

"I had no traction and it felt like I was racing on ice the entire time, which led to numerous errors."

“That race was among the toughest I’ve ever experienced… The good news is that all of us at Aprilia are encountering the same problems. With four riders providing feedback, we can collaborate to figure out a solution.”

Another positive development for Aprilia is that the upcoming Misano race this weekend, held on their home turf, is expected to provide significantly better traction.

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