Late progress for Pecco Bagnaia but 2025 Ducati MotoGP bike “completely different to my style”
Francesco Bagnaia found a “small detail” in British MotoGP Practice to help his front end confidence issues.
Francesco Bagnaia says he is still encountering front-end confidence issues on the 2025 Ducati MotoGP bike despite late progress at the British MotoGP.
Bagnaia said that he was able to find a “small detail” that helped his confidence in the last part of Friday afternoon’s Practice session.
“Finally, for the first time, in the last part of the session, we found something that worked in the front,” the Ducati Lenovo Team rider said on Friday at the British Grand Prix.
“It’s a small detail which made a little difference. It gave me a little more confidence.
“Tomorrow, we will try to go in that direction.”
Overall, though, Bagnaia was still struggling for front confidence, despite having started the day with two setups in order to try to find a solution to this issue.
“Two completely different set-ups gave me the same feeling in the front,” he said.
“The other set-up was exactly the same set-up from last year’s race. But it didn’t work.
“I was a bit ashamed because I wanted the feeling but it didn’t work.”
He added: “It’s strange because I cannot feel the front. We need to enter the corner fast but we cannot do the same as last year with the brake.
“We need to release it much before. It is completely different to my riding style.
“I always enter with more lean angle and brake. Now, I cannot.
“It’s not what has happened to Marc [Marquez].”
Bagnaia added that the front tyre choice for him this year is different to last year, but Alex Marquez on the 2024 Ducati can use the tyre Bagnaia used last year.
“The strange thing is that, last season, we did the whole weekend with the medium front,” he said.
“This year the medium front is tough to use, with a lack of grip.
“The only ones who used the medium front for the time attack were the GP24s.
“We need to understand what Alex Marquez is doing because he is much stronger than everybody else, and copy.
“The lack of performance is closed by Marc, this is the difference.”
Alex joined the Crash.net team in August of 2024 having covered consumer and racing motorcycle news at Visordown for two years.
