Aleix Espargaro: New helmet development “saved my race” in Thai MotoGP

Aleix Espargaro’s Thai Grand Prix was “saved” by a new development from his helmet supplier which helped him cope with what he viewed as poor visibility.

In comparison to, for example, last year’s Japanese Grand Prix, this year’s Thai race was much less wet.

Espargaro, though, said that the visibility was “very bad” in Buriram, and thanked his helmet supplier for developing specific tear-offs for use in the rain which he said “saved my race”.

“I’m happy that Kabuto has been working this year with rain tear-offs,” Espargaro said.

“I didn’t have them last year. Today they saved my race. I just had two, I will need five or six.

“Two tear-offs, plus cleaning with the hand was good enough, but the problem is that we don’t have tear-offs for the bike, so the bike was completely blind, was full brown, and in the straight you had to look [over the screen], so it was a bit tricky, but I’m very happy about the helmet.”

Espargaro’s race was not a standout moment from his almost-finished career, but it did ultimately end with a top-10 finish.

“I was not fantastic,” Espargaro said after finishing ninth in Thailand. “I did a good start, a good first part of the race; actually I was behind Pedro [Acosta] the first two or three laps, but then I never had a really good feeling, a really good pace.

“I made a mistake in turn three, I went wide and I lost a lot of seconds and positions.

“After that, I just tried to concentrate with myself, tried to do a good pace.

“I don’t like to justify my race by a position when the gap to the winners is high, but during this weekend when I have struggled a lot — I had a big crash on Friday, I did five laps on Friday — so after a difficult weekend, P9 in the race, I’m happy.”

Espargaro explained that the grip issues Aprilia suffered in the dry in Thailand remained in wet conditions.

“They [the problems] remain,” he said. “In the middle section of the track where you cannot transfer front-to-rear, we struggle a lot with the rear grip.

“Maverick [Vinales] and I had similar problems. We were together, when I made a mistake I lost the wheel of Maverick, but we had very similar problems.

“The heat problems, obviously, we didn’t suffer in the wet race, which is great, but we still have the same problems. So, Aprilia have to work hard for the future.”

On the other hand, the factory Aprilia riders, particularly Espargaro’s teammate Vinales, were closer to the win in Thailand than they have been in other wet races.

For example, in Thailand in 2022, Vinales finished seventh and was 14.566 seconds off the win, but in last weekend’s Buriram race he was seventh again and 8.498 seconds off the win.

“We didn’t finish that far from the winner, from the podium, which in a very long race like this is always positives,” said Esaprgaro, who was 10 seconds further back of his teammate in ninth.

“So, both bikes in the top-10 is a good results, and our lap times in mid-race were not very far from the podium ones.”

Espargaro explained that there were some setup changes which led to Aprilia’s wet weather improvements in Thailand.

“Before the race, I tried to go back to the 2024 aerodynamics package to try to turn more with the rear,” he said.

“We made the bike a lot shorter, trying to put load on the rear to gain some grip. In the wet, it works, it pays off, and I’m happy, actually.

“Our idea is to test next week in the dry in Malaysia, to go back to the 2024 aerodynamic spec, also with the swingarm with this aerodynamic wing that KTM is running. We don’t stop to try to improve.”