Pedro Acosta will debut in MotoGP this year, and first of all he will need to adapt himself to a completely different category compared to Moto2. Red Bull GasGas Tech3 will give time to the rookie to develop himself, being aware that the adaptation process takes a lot of time.
Nicolas Goyon, team manager, said to the press: ‘To learn and to understand all the tools to be fast on a MotoGP bike takes almost one year. You need to learn the electronics, you need to learn all the devices, you need to learn the tyres. So it’s a quite tough job, and especially with the MotoGP bikes nowadays you have so many different components. Now as we can see the aerodynamics is another big topic. And you need to learn how to play with all these tools. It takes a lot of time. And even if you take a quite competitive rookie, you see it takes some time. So let’s give him some time, let’s work properly, calmly, and then we’ll see which position we can achieve’.
The first contact that Acosta had with the KTM RC16 was in the Valencia test last november, making already a good impression: ‘For sure we saw that in only one day, at the end of the day the riding style was already quite natural and this was something surprising. For a rookie to be at this level straightaway, to have this – let’s say – MotoGP style after one day was quite surprising. The other next thing was checking the data we could see that for example the brake pressure – something quite new for a rookie, you have carbon brakes, the way to brake the bike is quite different, so takes quite a while to understand. But straightaway after one day the shape was not so bad and the braking points were already at a good level. Clearly we’ve said: «This is already there, this is already a good point, and let’s see in Sepang what will be the next stage». But it was already a starting point’, Goyon said.
As for the work Acosta needed to do this winter at home, the Frenchman epxlained that was mainly on the physical condition: ‘For sure all the part on the bike itself can only be learn on the track. It’s not that you print a paper, all this has to be learned riding the bike. The main part that you can develop on your own is the physical condition. MotoGP is quite demanding, so if you start the Sepang test already with a OK physical condition it’s already a good point. And I can tell you this test is really demanding. This year he will have to ride for six days. It’s a lot. Last year, for example, we had only five days here – it’s only one day less, but it’s counting. Six days is really tricky. And after these days we’ll know a little bit better what is the potential and what is the next step to learn. It won’t be easy, but that’s the target’.