Pedro Acosta admits concerns over tyre degradation stopped his hopes of catching Marc Marquez in the fight for Aragon MotoGP victory.
Acosta put on arguably one of his best performances in the MotoGP class in Sunday’s Aragon Grand Prix, taking advantage of some audacious moves to take second place.
However, the 22-year-old fell short of what would have been a maiden victory in the premier class after becoming stuck behind nine-time world champion Marquez, who had the pace to eventually pull away in the lead.
Acosta admitted second place was perhaps the maximum that he could extract from the weekend, but was unable to challenge Marquez due to concerns over tyre degradation.
The Spaniard also suggested had he attempted a move at mid-race distance, he wouldn’t have been able to maintain the lead due to KTM’s tyre struggles.
“We’ve got the most out of what we had,” Acosta said via Motorsport.com.
The start was a bit better than yesterday’s, the first few laps were very good and I managed to latch onto Marc. We can be happy because I’m getting 100% out of what I’ve got; for now, there’s nothing more we can do.
“The intention to catch Marc was there, but the potential we had was another matter. I knew that if I pushed too hard halfway through the race, I’d run out of tyres at the end.”
Acosta also admitted that he has made changes to his riding style to help preserve his Michelin tyres more during longer races.
KTM has often struggled with keeping its tyres in the correct window, with late-race pace specialist Enea Bastianini losing the knack of carving through the field in the final few laps during his time at Tech3.
However, this weekend saw the KTMs improve across the board with their management and late race pace, although Acosta put this down being less aggressive with his approach.
“Normally, I’m the one that always goes more tight inside the corners and uses more tyres than everyone else and now I’m trying to change my style a bit.
“At the end, if I want to be ready when my moment arrives, I need to start to see all the options and see all the ways of racing.”
Pedro Acosta reveals the small thing that may have cost chance of first MotoGP win
Acosta is still waiting for the elusive first MotoGP victory, with time running out to achieve the feat with KTM.
The Spanish rider will depart the manufacturer after working with them since his debut in Moto3, but continues to push for improvements to get his first win in the class.
Acosta did suggest that KTM is lacking in qualifying pace which hinders his progress on Sundays, but he mainly wanted to focus on the aspects that already work rather than the things that could be holding him back.
“It’s missing many things, but at the moment, I want to concentrate on the ones that I have,” Acosta said.
“In the end, I’m missing a lot in the short distance, especially in qualifying. Normally, I struggle to be in that first row that normally gives you a bit of advantage at the beginning of the races.
“But at the moment I wanted to be focused on the things that can make me win a race and not the ones that I don’t have.”
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