Alvaro Bautista finishes in fifteenth at Le Mans

Despite the poor grip throughout the MotoGP weekend at Le Mans which conditioned the performance of the RS-GP bikes in the race as well, Alvaro Bautista finished in fifteenth place, enough to earn another championship point.

It was a weekend full of hard work for Aprilia Racing Team Gresini, penalised more than the others by the poor grip conditions which, with unpredictable weather also being an accomplice, characterised the sessions on the French track.

Bautista rode a very courageous race, keeping up with the pack in the initial phases, losing ground as the tyre began to wear and then finding a good feeling at the end which made it look like perhaps a better result was in store but, although he closed the gap behind Laverty, he was unable to attack for fourteenth place.

The team’s two RS-GP bikes crossing the wire is in any case a good result for a team with the primary objective of the season being development of the MotoGP project.

ALVARO BAUTISTA
“I got off the line well, moving up in the pack and with fresh tyres I was doing well, but as soon as they started to wear the bike became more unstable and more difficult to ride. We need to analyse all the race data carefully because toward the end the bike improved, becoming easier to ride, maybe because of the emptier tank and lower weight. We’ll wait for Mugello. An evolution of the bike will be ready there and in the meantime I’d like to thank the team as they are working very hard. We finished here as well, earning a point, and given the conditions we found this is a good sign of confidence.”

Source: Gresini