First corner “mess” blamed for Pedro Acosta’s difficult Thai MotoGP sprint
KTM rider was a distant sixth in first race of 2025
Pedro Acosta says he missed his top five “target” in the 2025 MotoGP Thai Grand Prix sprint after getting caught up in a “mess” at the first corner.
The factory KTM rider has been quick all winter on the RC16 and came into the opening round of the year as podium hopeful.
But hindered by yellow flags in qualifying, Acosta was forced to start from seventh and found himself unable to disengage his front start device off the line in the sprint when Trackhouse rider Ai Ogura cut in front of him.
Acosta lost ground as a result, with rocketing tyre temperatures while sitting in the pack casting him 11.7s away from race winner Marc Marquez in sixth.
“Well, at the end we made a mess in the first corner because Ogura was coming to me, I was in the curve normally, and I was not able to disengage the front device and all the mess started,” he said.
“When you are losing positions with this heat and how quickly the temperature went up and the pressure went up, it became a bit different.
“Anyway, our target was top five, try to find this consistency there. After that it’s done.
“We have to be happy. After the mess that was the first corner we were not bad at all.”
Acosta says his issues with controlling the temperature in his front tyre made it harder to ride because the bike reacted differently at ever corner.
“[The heat affects things] a lot, because at the end you see the top five and they didn’t have an overtake in the whole race,” he added.
“At the end, the problem now the differences are so small, it makes a big change.
“At the moment you overheat the tyre and you can’t lower it, it’s a disaster.
“At the end, everyone was catching their pace and more or less the lap time was similar.
“Everyone who had big amounts of bikes in front, like Fabio [Quartararo], like Jack [Miller], like myself, were the only ones riding in 1m31s because at the moment the front tyre is cooked it’s completely done.
“For example, Fabio went wide at Turn 3 and I passed him. Then I went wide at Turn 4 and he passed me.
“Then he goes wide again in Turn 8 and pass him again, then I go wide in Turn 12.
“It’s quite difficult to plan how to ride because not every corner is the same sensation. It’s quite difficult but it’s something that we have to manage.”
Quotes provided by Crash MotoGP Editor Peter McLaren
