Pedro Acosta “much faster compared to last week” but…

Pedro Acosta knocked 6.796s from his Sprint time compared to Misano 1, setting a pace that would have put him in the wheeltracks of race winner Jorge Martin just two weeks ago.

Unfortunately for the GASGAS Tech3 MotoGP rookie, Saturday’s Emilia Romagna Sprint winning time by Francesco Bagnaia was a similar 6.265s quicker than Martin two weeks ago.

Acosta at least finished one place higher, fifth instead of sixth, and was again the top non-Ducati rider. But he admitted the gap to the top remains daunting.

“It was quite a good day. Also we were much faster in the Sprint race compared to last week, for this we have to be happy,” Acosta said.

“But we still have to work because finishing six seconds from first is quite a big [gap]. For this we need to see where to improve for tomorrow.”

Acosta was seen running the eye-catching swingarm wings, previously used on wild-card Pol Espargaro’s prototype bike.

“We used some of the aerodynamic elements we tested here and finally some of them helped us to keep the pace,” said Tech3 team manager Nicolas Goyon.

“We achieved our target but Pedro knows there is room to be better and that’s what we’ll aim for in tomorrow’s race.”

Brad Binder was the next best KTM, one place and 1.5s behind Acosta, whose team-mate Augusto Fernandez finished 20th.

Combined Emilia Romagna/San Marino Sprint race times (13 laps):

1    Francesco BAGNAIA    19'50.237    Emilia Romagna
2    Jorge MARTIN    19'50.522    Emilia Romagna
3    Enea BASTIANINI    19'51.556    Emilia Romagna
4    Marc MARQUEZ    19'55.623    Emilia Romagna
5    Jorge MARTIN    19'56.502    San Marino
6    Pedro ACOSTA    19'56.817    Emilia Romagna
7    Francesco BAGNAIA    19'57.997    San Marino
8    Franco MORBIDELLI    19'58.334    San Marino
9    Brad BINDER    19'58.38    Emilia Romagna
10    Enea BASTIANINI    19'58.543    San Marino
11    Fabio QUARTARARO    19'58.642    Emilia Romagna
12    Marco BEZZECCHI    19'59.202    Emilia Romagna
13    Franco MORBIDELLI    19'59.508    Emilia Romagna
14    Maverick VIÑALES    19'59.775    Emilia Romagna
15    Miguel OLIVEIRA    20'1.779    Emilia Romagna
16    Aleix ESPARGARO    20'2.286    Emilia Romagna
17    Marc MARQUEZ    20'2.971    San Marino
18    Pedro ACOSTA    20'3.298    San Marino
19    Brad BINDER    20'6.481    San Marino
20    Alex MARQUEZ    20'6.803    Emilia Romagna
21    Jack MILLER    20'7.228    San Marino
22    Fabio QUARTARARO    20'7.517    San Marino
23    Alex MARQUEZ    20'7.854    San Marino
24    Maverick VIÑALES    20'8.160   San Marino
25    Aleix ESPARGARO    20'8.585    San Marino
26    Jack MILLER    20'9.648    Emilia Romagna
27    Luca MARINI    20'10.338    Emilia Romagna
28    Johann ZARCO    20'10.835    Emilia Romagna
29    Raul FERNANDEZ    20'10.979    Emilia Romagna
30    Fabio DI GIANNANTONIO    20'13.056    Emilia Romagna*
31    Takaaki NAKAGAMI    20'15.631    Emilia Romagna
32    Augusto FERNANDEZ    20'15.668    Emilia Romagna
33    Joan MIR    20'17.445    Emilia Romagna
34    Johann ZARCO    20'17.621    San Marino
35    Pol ESPARGARO    20'18.044    San Marino
36    Miguel OLIVEIRA    20'18.497    San Marino
37    Augusto FERNANDEZ    20'19.944    San Marino
38    Raul FERNANDEZ    20'20.782    San Marino
39    Luca MARINI    20'21.249    San Marino
40    Alex RINS    20'21.375    San Marino
41    Takaaki NAKAGAMI    20'21.656    San Marino

*8-second post-race time penalty.