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It was a bitter day for Aleix Espargaró at Mugello. The Aprilia rider, after starting from the twelfth spot on the grid, was penalized straight away with a ride through due to a jump start. After that, his Sunday ended up in the gravel, forcing him to retire.
And yet, the Italian round is not an entire waste and the stats speak clearly. In the third sector, the RS-GP proved to be fastest (35”066), obviously ahead of all the rest by a couple of tenths, with only Rossi (35”169) and Dovizioso (35”201) managing to come close. What’s more, in the first sector, Espargaró (25”204) was slower only than the Ducatis ridden by Dovizioso (25.118) and Petrucci ( 25.155), despite a top speed on the straight that was 6 mph slower than the Ducati, a sign of the Aprilia’s great speed on the first corners of the track. And if all that is still not enough to render justice to the Noale based manufacturer’s product, we should point out the fifth best time in the race set by Espargaró, faster even than Rossi and Marquez.
Getting back to Espargaró’s day, from the start it was an uphill battle.
“It is a real pity. For the first time in my career I made a jump start and that is not what we needed. First and foremost I would like to apologize to the team. This is a particularly important race for Aprilia and the RS-GP was working very well.”
Espargaró has a bitter taste in his mouth and with good reason.
“The sensations were the best of the entire season. My pace was in the low 48s even with low motivation after the ride through. I was able to lap at a low 1’48”, without even having to use slipstreams. This shows that we could have battled for important positions.”
Then there was the DNF.
“After running off track in the gravel, something wasn't working right with gear selection, so I made a pit stop. Once again, we showed that we are fast, even if we are going home without any points. Now we need to consistently get back into the positions that we deserve."
Sam Lowes can’t be too terribly satisfied with his race either, 19th and penultimate over the line: “I expected to be able to do a better race today, because in the first 6 laps I felt very much at ease. I was able to overtake several riders, lapping at good times straight away. At a certain point I began to lose the good feeling with the front end and so I struggled to maintain a good pace, compromising the rest of my race.”
In spite of it all, however, Sam tries to see the glass half full.
“I want to look at the various positive sides that came out this weekend. I am happy to have finished the race and to have achieved a lap time that was actually only one second off the best. I am learning a lot in every race and we are moving in the right direction.”
