MotoMatters.com | Kropotkin Thinks

At the end of every Friday practice, the riders like to remind us that it is only Friday, and we shouldn't read too much into the times. Fat chance, of course, but they have a point. But "it's only Friday" takes on extra potency at the Termas de Rio Hondo circuit, given the changing nature of the track. Especially after it rained heavily overnight, and the track started the day wet and took a long time to dry out. High humidity and low temperatures add another layer of complexity, just to liven things up.

The track started off cleaner than expected. "Yesterday when I made the track walk, I thought that the track was more dirty," Marco Bezzecchi said at the end of the first day. "But when I rode the bike this morning, to be honest it was much much better compared to the past times we came here."

The track may have started from a better base, but the grip levels were still changing on pretty much every exit as more and more rubber got laid down. That makes working out where riders stand relatively complicated, though we can take a stab at it by looking at the timesheets.

It will come as no surprise that Marc Márquez has the best pace, posting high 1'37s on used tires. After all, he was fastest in both practice sessions on Friday, breaking the lap record by four tenths of a second in the afternoon. A lap record that had stood since the Bridgestone era, set by Márquez on a Honda in 2014.

That was despite having to work on electronics in the morning, he said. "We didn’t have a base setup with the electronics, especially with the engine brake, where I am a little bit special on that area." Once they fine-tuned that, Márquez was off and running. Though that had not surprised Ducati Lenovo teammate Pecco Bagnaia particularly. "I thought that he would push like this, because in these conditions he's always very competitive," Bagnaia said.

It wasn't Márquez who had impressed Bagnaia. "Who impressed me the most was Zarco, who did incredible things today," the Italian said. The LCR Honda rider was seventh fastest in timed practice, but his pace was also impressive. Zarco was the only rider who managed a 1'38.0 on used tires. Not enough to catch Márquez, but enough to be in with a shot at the podium. "A very good day," the Frenchman said. He is hoping for a solid qualifying session, because with a good grid position, he is hopeful of aiming for the podium.

Behind Marc Márquez and Johann Zarco, the riders with race pace are Alex Márquez and Marco Bezzecchi. Bezzecchi's fourth place on the timesheet is even more impressive when you realize that it is the single fast lap where the factory Aprilia rider is still struggling. But the results in Argentina, coming on top of what happened in Thailand, are more confirmation that the 2025 RS-GP made a very big step from the 2024 bike.

"The front confidence that I have is quite good," Bezzecchi said of the bike. "Also the drive grip is not too bad. It’s a good bike in the traction area. But I miss some stability."

Bezzecchi, like Johann Zarco, is fast in Argentina because it is a track he likes. The same is true for Alex Márquez, who has the added bonus of extra confidence after an outstanding weekend in Thailand. He has good race pace, and managed a strong time attack, and that made him positive about the weekend.

The Gresini Ducati rider is also optimistic because he feels he is even closer to his brother here than he was two weeks ago in Thailand. "I think that we were one step back, and here half. We are closer," he said.

The top of the timesheets was a real mix, as riders took advantage of a tow. Alex Rins got into sixth using Marc Márquez as a target, while Fabio Quartararo had intended to follow Pecco Bagnaia, but Bagnaia had crashed out at Turn 2. "It's the only time that I really wanted to follow someone, because I always do my lap time alone, but unfortunately it lasted only one corner," Quartararo said. "Tomorrow we will try to follow someone, because I think it's a help for us this time."

Fabio Di Giannantonio was another rider who used the riders ahead, including Rins and Marc Márquez, as a target. The Pertamina VR46 rider came out of it very well, shooting up into second place at the end of the session. But Di Giannantonio felt that his time was more the logical conclusion of the work done and improvement found over the session than solely the result of a tow.

Having missed out on testing after breaking his collarbone on the first day of the Sepang test, Di Giannantonio was still adapting to the Ducati GP25 and understanding how it worked. It was already better than the GP23 he rode last year, allowing him to enter corners faster and carry more speed at the apex, his strongest points. Though he is still hampered by his shoulder injury, he can see that both he and the bike have a lot of potential, which they are only just starting to tap.

Another reason riders were following each other was because the track kept changing, and the teams are still struggling to work out the best balance with the bike. Though the tires haven't changed from 2024, the bikes have, and the teams are trying to find the right weight distribution between the front and the rear, and get the right amount of pitch in braking and acceleration.

That work explains why the KTMs have made a step forward here, with Brad Binder in fifth and Pedro Acosta in ninth. "After Thailand it was really clear that we were struggling in the braking zones and especially with the heat so when we got here we tried to do something to make the front end work a bit better and to stop the bike a bit better and carry more speed into the corners."

That work, on finding the right balance, had helped Pecco Bagnaia make a big step forward. At the Buriram test, and on the race weekend, they had tried something that was preventing Bagnaia from braking the way he wanted. On Friday afternoon at Termas, they had switched back to the older setting, and that had made a huge difference. The bike was no longer a "GP24.9" but a "GP24.7" he said.

"From the Thailand test I was struggling a lot in the braking parts," Bagnaia explained. "So the first part of brakes and entering, and letting the bike go into the corner. And my feeling wasn't the same as last year, I was struggling to stop well the bike, to control the slides. So it was difficult and tough for me. This afternoon we changed a bit the bike, and it was better. I feel more like last year."

Bagnaia only just squeaked through to Q2 after a crash at the start of his second fast run. He had been conservative on his first run, and entered Turn 2 on his second run carrying a bit more speed and less brake, which caused the rear to push the front, and down he went.

That left him hanging for a few anxious minutes, as he was forced to watch from the sidelines and wait to see if his first time was good enough. "Already when I was on the scooter, I was thinking, OK, I will finish 11th by a few tenths, it will be s**t," Bagnaia said. "But luckily I was inside."

So it is really only Friday, and you can't read too much into the times. Marc Márquez is fast, Johann Zarco is faster than you expect, and Alex Márquez and Marco Bezzecchi are very close. Pecco Bagnaia is in much better shape than you might think, and there is a list of names as long as your arm who could cause a surprise.

There were a few off-track things that are worth bringing up. First, Aprilia are trying to push through a rule change which would allow Jorge Martin to test a MotoGP bike before he tries to ride on a race weekend. For manufacturers which aren't Category D for concessions (i.e. Honda and Yamaha), contracted riders cannot test outside of the official IRTA tests after Jerez, Aragon, and Misano.

But Aprilia would like to change that for riders who find themselves in a similar situation to Jorge Martin, where they miss all of preseason testing and a number of races. Their argument seems to be that it makes no sense to bring a rider to an event, only to withdraw them after practice.

That wouldn't mean fewer bikes on the grid, however. Under section 1.11.3 sub i), MotoGP teams are allowed to withdraw riders ahead of qualifying, and then replace them for qualifying. (Moto2 and Moto3 teams can replace a withdrawn rider at the end of Friday). So even if Jorge Martin came to Qatar, tried to ride on Friday, and found it was too physically demanding, they could still substitute Lorenzo Savadori from Saturday onward.

What Aprilia really want, of course, is for Jorge Martin to be allowed to catch up on the testing and riding he has missed so far this year. But that would open a can of worms if he was allowed. Defining when a rider would be allowed extra testing and why would produce all sorts of strange edge cases. (How many laps during preseason testing? Do laps at the test after the final race of the previous year count? How many races do they have to miss to be allowed extra testing? Does that count for riders missing races mid-season? Does this only apply to riders swapping manufacturers? What about swapping teams? Etc etc.)

Changing the sporting regulations requires a simple majority of the four members of the Grand Prix Commission: Dorna, the FIM, IRTA for the teams, and the MSMA on behalf of the factories. Aprilia faces an uphill task trying to get at least two of those bodies on their side. Or indeed even getting the other factories on their side.

Finally, to those Pedro Acosta rumors. You know the ones, about Acosta having an option to the Pertamina VR46 squad if the KTM doesn't perform this year, or if KTM isn't racing in 2026. The rumor was raised again this weekend, and the possibility mooted that Acosta could switch to Ducati. "It all depends on KTM," Acosta's manager Albert Valera told Spanish daily AS. Acosta is hoping to win many championships with the Austrian factory, and they expect KTM to be competitive.

These rumors are unlikely to go away any time soon. It is usually possible to break a contract under certain conditions before the summer break, but at the moment, KTM is nowhere near qualifying for those conditions. The bike is making steps forward, and as long as Acosta believes KTM can give him a machine he can take to a championship fight, he will stay. But for riders, especially those with the talent and ambition of Pedro Acosta, doors never shut. So we'll see.

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