Pedro Acosta finished the MotoGP Thai GP in third place – marking his first podium in a rain race since moving up to the premier class, something that took him longer to achieve in Moto2.
The Spanish rider from Red Bull GasGas Tech3 commented in the press conference: ‘In the end, I don’t know why I was never really competitive in the wet in Moto2, only in last year’s Australia race, when I was coming from the back of the grid, I was quite fast. I was never really fast, because I remember here in 2022, I started from fifth and I was like 20th by the second corner’.
In Acosta’s view, tyres play a significant role: ‘It’s true that when I was in Moto2 with the Dunlop tyres, it was quite tricky, because it felt like a rock. It has been much better since we changed to Michelin’.
The KTM RC16’s record of strong performances in the wet wasn’t lost on the rookie, who noted: ‘And if you think about it, every guy who has jumped to KTM in these difficult conditions, in the wet, have been quite fast. Remember [Miguel] Oliveira in 2022, Brad [Binder] under the water in Spielberg, and how fast was Pol [Espargaró] even at the beginning of the project. So, they are doing a super nice job in Mattighofen’.