Braking an Aprilia weakness? “Barcelona changed my mind” - Fabiano Sterlacchini

Fast flowing corners good, stop-and-go corners bad. That has often been the stereotype for the Aprilia RS-GP in MotoGP.

But the separation became blurred at times last season, when the RS-GP lost some of its dominance through the faster sections at Catalunya for example, but surprised with a Sprint podium at the hard-braking Red Bull Ring (only to be blown away in the GP).

Aprilia’s new technical director Fabiano Sterlacchini said he shared the ‘braking weakness’ view when looking from the outside in his previous senior roles at Ducati and KTM.

But his mind was changed a little by the RS-GP’s performance in the hard braking areas at the Barcelona finale (where Aleix Espargaro finished 4th and 5th), then feedback from ex-Ducati riders Jorge Martin and Marco Bezzecchi at the post-race test.

“To be honest in terms of braking, as a competitor of Aprilia in the past, I was quite convinced about the weak point of the bike,” Sterlacchini said. “Looking at the performance that the bike [had] in Spielberg that is a typical ‘stop and go’.

“But then we had the test in Barcelona [and] it changed a bit in my mind the opinion I had.

“Because apart from the new riders, who both said how stable the front is and how much confidence they have, also the performance from Aleix in Barcelona in braking proved that the bike has the potential.

“We have to understand why in the past the bike, or the package in general, had a problem with strong braking and hairpin corners. Because clearly we cannot tolerate saying we have a weak point [if we want] to be competitive at every race.”

The unpredictable movement of the RS-GP under braking and acceleration, thought to be linked to the electronics, had also been a handicap.

“For sure [electronics] is an important area where we have been working in the off-season,” Sterlacchini confirmed.

“Especially because the movement we saw in Barcelona can force you to use a specific [set-up] solution to avoid this movement, and normally when you do this you have to renounce some performance.

“So for sure the electronics is an aspect where we are working. We are preparing some material for the next test [at Sepang], especially because we have in front of us a track [which is good for] testing electronics.”

Despite eight victories (Sprint and GP) since 2022 and being the only manufacturer to defeat Ducati last season, an Aprilia rider is yet to finish higher than fourth in the final MotoGP standings.

The buzzword at Aprilia heading into its new era with Martin, Bezzecchi and Sterlacchini is therefore ‘consistency’. But it’s easier said than done.

“How to make the bike more consistent? It is a day-by-day job with huge determination to make it more constant,” Sterlacchini said. “But I will say that sometimes we have to judge the situation based on the data. Otherwise we have only opinions.”

The Italian also highlighted that having eight Ducatis on the grid in recent seasons - numbers will drop to six in 2025 - had, by definition, aided their consistency.

“Obviously, I don’t want to say anything to remove any merit from the big performance that the Ducati bike has, but for sure having eight riders with different characteristics…

“If we look at say the performance of Bagnaia and Jorge in Austin [off the podium] then it has been down. But in the end Bastianini was there [in third]!

“So the competitiveness has to be judged under the same conditions.”

Interestingly, Sterlacchini also explained the knock-on psychological effect of an uncompetitive weekend.

“Consistency is an important aspect of the bike. Why? This sport is made a lot by motivation and how convinced you are by what you are doing,” he said.

“Motivation is an important part of the performance and if you are struggling in one race then the negative effect, the drawback, is brought to the next race.

“So you might have a competitive package for the next race, but you are still affected by this negativeness. So consistency is a target.”

Summing up his philosophy for MotoGP design, Sterlacchini - who has taken over from HRC-bound Romano Albesiano - believes the key to success is merging rider feedback with cutting-edge engineering.

“Probably we are in a changing era for motorcycle sport,” he said.

“Before [design] was completely driven by the rider comments. Now it is becoming so complicated that it is not enough.

“So it is important to listen to the rider. And then the engineering and the analysis are, let me say, fundamental to obtain a better bike.

“Because riders try to understand what the bike is doing. But obviously, we cannot pretend they are a perfect ‘sensor’ with a perfect ‘CPU’ to understand everything. That is the reason why we [engineers] are there.

“So the philosophy is [finding] the perfect combination between feeling [for the rider] and the engineering aspects that are fundamental for performance.”

Sterlacchini’s RS-GP25 will next be on track with the factory’s new rider line-up of reigning champion Martin and triple race winner Bezzecchi during the Sepang test in early February.

Quotes provided by Crash.net Journalist Alex Whitworth.