What a great debut for Pedro Acosta in MotoGP as he placed eighth in today’s Sprint in Qatar. On a day when ‘everything was new’ for the rookie, the rider admitted that he just has to be ‘very happy’.
Speaking to the press on site, the Red Bull GASGAS Tech3 rider began by talking about his racing debut: ‘It wasn’t bad, it wasn’t bad. To be honest I’m very happy because in the end this practice was a question mark… everything was new: I got to the first corner after the start and looked everywhere to see what the other guys were doing. We have to be super happy. We’re making very good steps and today to go straight into Q2 behind Brad [Binder], and then to be eighth to give a reference to the factory team was also very good’.
Acosta was riding behind a MotoGP icon, and he felt the difficulties well, not knowing whether they came from the bike or the position he was in: ‘The feelings with the bike are coming and to be honest I was pretty f***ed. I was behind Marc Márquez the whole race, by 0.3s or 0.5s and I had this turbulence the whole race and it was very difficult to realise if it was the bike, if it was the turbulence, what it was, but we have to be happy’.
On the subject of overtaking and how to manage it, the rookie explained: ‘It was all good. To be honest, our bike is very good at braking, so we have a small advantage. It’s true that, on the other hand, the overtake I made on Maverick [Viñales] was the first in my MotoGP career and it was good. We have to be much more focused on the aerodynamics so that we don’t hit anyone in the back. Today was a first for us in many ways. It was a strange day, with one practice and three attacks on the times, waiting 15 minutes and then going back out for Q2. We had a lot of stress so you have to be happy’.