Enea Bastianini at a loss over Malaysian GP pace: “I am angry”
Ducati rider came nowhere close to 2023 race winning pace last weekend
Enea Bastianini is at a loss to explain his disappointing pace in the MotoGP Malaysian Grand Prix and is “angry” at being unable to fight for victory.
The Sepang circuit proved to be Bastianini’s best of a difficult 2023 campaign as he took his only grand prix victory of the year.
That form had many predicting him to be a factor in the win battle this year, but it failed to materialise, as Bastianini struggled to get on terms with fellow GP24 riders Francesco Bagnaia and Jorge Martin.
Qualifying sixth, Bastianini could do no more than a distant third - finishing 10.484s behind team-mate Bagnaia - in the grand prix and felt he was “lucky” to have Marc Marquez crash out of the podium in front of him.
“No, I’m not very satisfied because I fought a lot with the bike all the weekend,” he said on Sunday.
“We started on a good foot, but after we lost something. I was confident to resolve that problem for this morning, but nothing changed.
“I’m lucky today in the race because Marquez crashed, but for the rest nothing is positive.”
Bastianini says he struggled for mid-corner speed, but doesn’t really know why.
“I don’t know,” he replied when asked what was causing his pace woes.
“I was slow in the middle of the corner, I was without corner speed because every time I make something different, if I enter much faster compared to the lap before, it was impossible.
“Today it was impossible for me to give 100%. I am angry.”
With Marc Marquez remounting from his crash to finish 12th, Bastianini is now a point behind him in their battle for third in the standings.
Looking to the final round, Bastianini joked that team-mate Bagnaia “can help me” in that battle in response to questions about supporting the reigning champion’s title defence.
“I think I can help Pecco, and Pecco - if he wants - he can help me,” Bastianini beamed.
“It depends on the starting grid, it depends on the weekend, if Jorge does good stuff that weekend.
“Pecco is very competitive the same, he did a fantastic job. I think 24 points for him will be not easy to close, and Jorge has to do a big mistake.
“But I think to be honest it will be hard, but probably it’s more simple for me because I have only one point to close the gap [to Marquez].”
