Pedro Acosta piles pressure on KTM: “I don’t accept and I’m not patient"

KTM rider Pedro Acosta says he will not be “patient” through the brand’s current MotoGP struggles and says he will “not wait all my life to be a champion”.

The British Grand Prix proved to be a difficult weekend for the KTM brand, as none of its riders made it out of Q1 in qualifying, though Pedro Acosta salvaged sixth in Sunday’s chaotic race.

Acosta made a fiery statement on Saturday at Silverstone, backing KTM’s ability to build a good bike but urging it to provide solutions quicker now.

After Sunday’s grand prix, which he branded “a race of hopelessness”, Acosta says the KTM’s lack of rear grip caused him too many problems.

“Well, not a strange race. It was a race of hopelessness,” he said.

“It’s quite sad to see that you try to be perfect in acceleration and picking up [the bike] and [lean] angles and try to be close [to others] and then lose everything in acceleration for the clear thing that we don’t have this amount of grip that the others bike have.

“But it is what it is and we have to keep going.”

Pedro Acosta to KTM: “I don’t accept and I’m not patient"

Asked by Crash.net if he now needs to accept the situation and learn patience, Acosta replied bluntly: “I don’t accept and I’m not patient. That’s it.

“Opportunity passes one time in life. I will not take all of my life to be a champion in this championship. I need help from the factory. That’s it.

“You are only young until you are not.

“Many stars in the championship grow so fast and disappear as fast. Freddie Spencer.

“You remember? He won two titles, then had something with his arm and then never came back the same.

“At the end, it’s not that it’s only myself. You see the four KTMs out of Q2 this week and struggling a lot this weekend. We need help from the factory.

“Now I’m talking about the four riders - not only me.”

Acosta remains linked to a move away from KTM at the end of the season, but once again insists he still has another year on his current contract and “really believes in this project”.

“But this weekend I talked quite seriously that I need help,” he said.

“I don’t want to come here with KTM and just burn fuel. I want to compete.

“And today I was able to compete more or less, until one time when I was in the group of Marc [Marquez], Franco [Morbidelli], Jack [Miller] and Alex [Marquez] and I was not able to fight.

“This is the thing that is burning my blood: to be so close and don’t catch it and not be able to do it, and it doesn’t matter what you do as it never arrives.”