Role reversal
It used to seem like a coincidence, something that happens once in a while. But now it is becoming a consolidated trend: even in Germany, at Sachsenring, the best Aprilias were not the factory ones from the official team, but the ‘customer’ ones from the Trackhouse team. Of course, for Noale this weekend there was the absence of Marco Bezzecchi due to injury to consider, but meanwhile it has become four consecutive weekends in which the Ogura-Fernandez pair has scored more points than those combined by the black bikes.
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However, this risks becoming a problem for the factory team, which sees the red specter of Marc Marquez approaching ever closer, having gone from 102 to 18 points behind the top of the standings in just four rounds. The one enjoying this unexpected reversal of power relations within the Aprilia ‘fleet’ is Davide Brivio, who however, speaking to the microphones of Sky Sport MotoGP, still wanted to say kind words about those in the Noale company who are treating Trackhouse as if it were a second factory team.
Same material and maximum support
“A great credit and thanks go to all of Aprilia, the whole company, the people on the track, the boys and girls of Noale who provide us with this bike – explained Brivio – the fact that now we are more often ahead also depends a bit on the circumstances: here (in Germany) there was no Marco Bezzecchi who surely could have been in the race. I don’t know what problem Jorge Martin had, he fell a little behind. It must be said that it is true that our riders are in good shape at the moment, but I think that if Marco had been here he would have fought. We, it’s true, are in good shape. This is a good moment and the riders are fast, they always fight for the top positions”.
Brivio then confirmed that the material provided by Noale to the American team is practically the same as that used on the official RS-GP26s: “Do Bezzecchi and Martin suffer more from the pressure? I don’t know. What I can say is that we have the same material. We benefit from the maximum that Aprilia can give us. There may be small differences sometimes, maybe there is some new part that can reach us one race later, but it is simply a matter of production timing. But we receive everything that Aprilia can provide: there is data sharing, our technicians always hold meetings together with the factory team technicians. With Fabiano [Sterlacchini] there is great collaboration, he is always here in the box listening to the riders, so we work almost as if we were a single team. Then afterwards everyone takes their own path in terms of setting, choices, tuning. If I can give credit to us it is that we are trying to do work that follows what our riders need. Then the riders now go on track, are in shape and make good use of this potential”.
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