70 amcn.com.au
APRILIA’S SECOND SEASON
with its first full prototype
since the RS Cube triple was
an up-and-down affair. But
MotoGP’s smallest factory team
learnt plenty with the RS-GP.
The team’s highlight was
Aragon, where Aleix Espargaró
finished sixth, less than seven
seconds behind winner Marc
Márquez, a difference of just
three tenths a lap.
“If you look at our level of
technology and performance,
we are very happy with last
season, but if you look at
the points we scored, we are
disappointed,” says Aprilia
Racing manager Romano
Albesiano. “We made some
mistakes on the technical side
and the riders made some
mistakes, but this can happen
when everyone is pushing at
110 per cent. The next step for
2018 is to be consistently closer
to the front, which will be even
more difficult, but I think we
have the means to do it.”
Aprilia’s biggest problem last
season was a series of engine
blow-ups.
“We had three failures inraces,” says Albesiano. “The
first two were caused by
extreme high rpm. At each
corner you plan to reach a
certain rpm, but then you get
extra revs from wheelspin on
bumps. One of the failures was
at Barcelona, but the damagestarted at the previous race at
Mugello [like Yamaha’s 2016
Mugello blow-ups]. The third
failure, at Silverstone, was
caused by a bolt coming loose
inside the engine. We found a
way to fix the problem with a
mechanical modification. It’sall part of the process.”
Albesiano believes the
RS-GP to have excellent
overall performance – braking,
turning and traction – so
his focus for 2018 is detail
improvements: chassis
stiffness, engine cooling,
aerodynamics, ergonomics
and mass centralisation.
“Mid-corner turning is the
key to many things and our
experience tells us that this is
related to mass centralisation.
For 2017 we made a major
redesign of the mass centre:
higher, backward. We tried to
move the major weight as close
to that centre as possible. Now
it’s more a matter of moving
other components that are
far from the centre of mass to
improve braking stability and
turning.
“We also need to reduce
weight. We started 2017 at
the minimum weight limit,
but then we fitted a more
complicated exhaust, a more
complicated inlet system and
more thermal insulation of
parts, so the bike became a
bit fat.”APRILIA
Wins 0
Points 64
Final position Sixth
“We made some
mistakes on the
technical side
and the riders
made some
mistakes”
The only way is up
Romano Albesiano (left) and
Aleix Espargaró (bottom)
who will team up with Scott
Redding this year