Pecco Bagnaia credits ‘something that didn’t help before’ for Sepang MotoGP sprint win

Ducati’s Pecco Bagnaia says “something that didn’t really help much in the past” was the reason for his dominant sprint win from pole at the MotoGP Malaysian Grand Prix.

After getting knocked out of Q2 on Friday afternoon and finding no major improvement on his GP25, the double world champion looked set for another tough Saturday.

But he came through from Q1 to snatch pole on Saturday morning, before leading start-to-finish in the 10-lap sprint to claim his second win in the short races this season by over two seconds.

It was a stunning turnaround from one week ago at Phillip Island, where he was second-to-last and over 30s off the win in the sprint, having lapped 2.5s off the pace.

Like Motegi, but with a worse feeling

Pecco Bagnaia’s Sepang Saturday has drawn comparisons with what he achieved at the Japanese Grand Prix, though he admits he feels “a little less” good than he did at Motegi.

However, he said the changes Ducati made to his bike at Sepang were the first time he felt like he had been “helped significantly”.

“This win here is for the team, which works so hard, and like me, they're having trouble understanding it,” he told Sky Italy.

“We're alternating disappointing performances with excellent ones; we need to find the reason.

“I know perfectly well that it's not a clear situation, not for me and not for them.

“But we're working on it and doing everything we can to get out of it.

“Yesterday we were struggling; the feeling wasn't great to get into Q2.

“This morning we made some changes that helped me a lot. We're still having a bit of the same problem, but we can work on it, and fortunately, we found something that helped me.”

He added: “In Japan, I had a truly excellent feeling.

“Here, honestly, a little less so, but I have to say that this year is one of the first times the changes made have helped me significantly.

“So, maybe we’ve figured out the direction. But I don’t want to give anything away. Let’s take things very calmly; there’s another race tomorrow and it will be tough on tyres.”

Bagnaia was cagey on what exactly Ducati did to his GP25, but noted that it was something the brand had tried in the past with little success.

“It's something that didn't really help much in the past,” he explained.

“We tried it several times, but it didn't help. This year, the problem is getting in with the brakes and getting a grip on the throttle.

“The bike tends to push and push out, and it's hard to understand because it doesn't come from rear grip, but rather tends to lift.

“Today we made this change that helped me with that. I won't say what it is, also because I don't know everything perfectly, but it helped quite a bit.”

Ride height device didn’t work in Sepang sprint

Bagnaia’s sprint wasn’t trouble-free, as his ride height device stopped working after the start.

Though this affected him on the straights, he admits that he felt better exiting the corners.

“I was able to use the lowering device at the start, because otherwise it would have been a problem.

“Unfortunately, during the race, the usual button didn’t work; it wouldn’t go down and I couldn’t use it.

“It was a loss on the straight,  but coming out of the corners, it wasn’t bad, because it makes the shock absorber work better.

“I didn’t try using the button I push at the start to activate it while I was riding; maybe that would have worked.

“So, I did the race without the lowering system. It was the only negative thing when braking. But it wasn’t too bad when exiting corners.”