Official Programme # BritishGP
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It’ s been a rollercoaster year for Enea Bastianini. Midway through 2024, the go-lucky Italian was poised to challenge Jorge Martin and Pecco Bagnaia for the MotoGP™ title. Indeed, he showcased the speed to do so with a thrilling double— Tissot Sprint and Sunday victory— in front of the British fans at Silverstone last August.
Yet despite further wins in Misano and a Sprint victory in Thailand, he fell short in the fight for the championship top three in the final race of the season. A tricky pre-season followed, during which‘ The Beast’ struggled to adapt to KTM’ s RC16 while racing for Red Bull KTM Tech3.
His chances in 2025 looked grim, considering he placed 17th and 18th in the two pre-season tests that kicked off the year. Yet Bastianini’ s canny ability to ride smoothly and preserve tyres ensured he was able to rescue top-ten finishes in Thailand, Austin and Jerez at the beginning of the season.
Clearly, his talent has not gone away. Yet the 27-yearold is still attempting to get fully comfortable aboard the RC16, which needs to be ridden in a vastly different way to the Ducati GP24 he rode last year.
“ I try to carry a high corner speed, but at the moment this is the worst part in my riding,” he said.“ At the end it’ s been OK, but overall I ' m not happy because I ' m not riding comfortably. When you’ re uncomfortable, you can ' t push a lot.”
Yet his race-day performances have been crumbs of comfort in a tricky start— as have the recent results of Maverick Viñales, who pushed for podium places with the same bike in Austin and Jerez.
“ My problem is when I put the new tyre on— I don ' t understand why— but my grip is more or less the same as with the used tyre. This also depends on the temperature of the tyre, because I can ' t start very well. I ' m always 5 – 6 degrees( cooler) than the others, and in that part I lose a lot of time. If I try to ride normally, I go wide. Currently, this is the main problem.
“ But it ' s just for the moment. I’ m confident in some weeks we can resolve this problem and I can adapt better to the bike. Maverick also has been very, very fast and they have demonstrated we can do a great job with this bike.”