Bagnaia, Mugello to return as a protagonist
For a few weeks now, Francesco Bagnaia has been more smiling and optimistic when describing his feelings driving the Ducati GP26. The Jerez tests gave much more confidence to the two-time MotoGP world champion, who fell at Le Mans while fighting for the podium and after a second place in the Sprint; in Barcelona, due to various injuries, disqualifications and Aprilia’s bad day, “Pecco” secured the first podium of the season.
The Piedmontese, therefore, approaches Mugello with the strength of someone who has already been very fast here (five wins between Sprint and GP between 2022 and 2024) and the confidence of someone who is regaining speed. “Pecco,” however, wants to keep his feet on the ground and points to Fabio Di Giannantonio as the Ducati rider with the best chances this weekend.
Bagnaia’s words
“We have to be realistic. We are working well, but it is quite clear that Fabio is currently in better shape with our package. Aprilia is extremely strong, KTM is really fast. It is clear that it is a good track for Ducati and I know that my riding style suits Mugello very well, but we have to analyze all these aspects better and start improving from Friday,” this was his comment at the press conference. “It is the best weekend of the season, it is always fantastic to arrive at the track with your home machine. You feel the passion, you see more people on the circuit and it is fantastic. The track is one of the most beautiful, we enjoy every lap. It seems that this year it will also be quite hot, so it will be very very fun.”
Bagnaia then returned to the topic of safety, after it emerged in Barcelona that riders do not take the meetings in the Safety Commission very seriously: “It is difficult to convince the other riders to go, because it is about half an hour, maybe they are busy with other events or have a session with the physiotherapist, or have to work in the garage. For me it is a very important half hour, because the level of safety is higher and they are doing a good job, but it is important to have more voice and it is necessary that there are more people in the Safety Commission. We talked a bit with Luca, Franco and Valentino (Marini, Morbidelli and Rossi, ed.) about what happened in Barcelona. Surely asking not to do the third start is wrong, because if we do it it is clear that safety is there. One thing we can start studying is to help the riders all be in the same situation, because in my case I fell with a used tire from qualifying. Removing the lowering device?
I don’t think that is the solution: if we remove it, then the bikes will start to oscillate a bit more and this could cause wheelies. The point is that at the start, if you are behind, you want to gain positions, because you know that now it is harder to overtake and there is also the problem of tire pressure.”
