Unlike his teammate Maverick Viñales, who won the Sprint race, Aleix Espargaró faced some difficulties on Saturday at the Portuguese GP. The Aprilia rider finished eighth after starting from 13th on the grid, but he is not feeling entirely comfortable at Portimão.
The Spaniard admitted that he couldn’t do much with Álex Márquez (Gresini/Ducati) behind him during Q1, taking advantage to improve his lap time. Regarding the Sprint race, Espargaró described his performance as ‘decent’, considering that ‘in the last four/five laps’ he ‘was quite fast’. And he admitted: ‘I’m not riding brilliant, I’m not flowing on track, so I need to prove. Maverick has been fantastic all weekend, so hopefully I can learn something today and do a better race tomorrow’.
Despite acknowledging that the circuit does not suit his riding style, Espargaró denied using it as an excuse: ‘It’s not really the best track for my riding style – I prefer more circuits like Qatar, Barcelona, Malaysia. There are very aggressive brakes in turn 1, 3, 5; then ups-and-downs. It’s not really my riding style – I have not a super aggressive riding. But it’s not an excuse, I have to be fast everywhere’.
Tomorrow is the main race, and #41 believes he can finish among the top five: ‘I will learn this afternoon from Maverick and tomorrow I think the race will also be very different because is going to be longer, we are going to race with the medium tyre. So I think I cannot fight for the victory or the podium, but I think the top five can be realistic’.