168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:Aleix Espargaro will need to take part in Saturday’s Qualifying 1 session at the Portuguese MotoGP after a f🃏all on Friday afterno𒁏on, combined with yellow flags, left him in 14th place.

But the factory Aprilia rider, on the front row and Sprint podium in Qatar opener, was still only 0.755s from the top and confident in how th🌱e 2024 RꦬS-GP is performing around the roller-coaster challenge of a dusty Portimao.

“The bike’s working good. It’s my fault. I was not b🌄rilliant today riding it, but overall the bike is OK,” Espargaro said.

“I was always too late to adapt to the track,” he added. “Then in the worst moment I had a small crash. Then I took bike two, I went super fast in split o𝐆ne an🅷d then I found yellow flags for Morbidelli and I had no more time.

“We're 🎶missing a little bit of rear grip, especially with the medium [race] tyre. But there’s still time to improve the bike and also the track tomorrow will improve a lot.

“Anyway, I think🦋 tomorrow I will be close to the t🅘op guys. But I will have to go to Q1.

“[Making Qualifying 2 ಞdirectly] is always difficult, because it's at least 14-15 very faౠst riders. So Q1’s it's gonna be fun to watch. I feel like we can go through but it's not going to be easy.”

Aleix's old school style: 'In a lot of points, I have a big advantage'

Espargaro’s drama meant team꧑-mate Maverick Vinales was the top Aprilia rider, in seventh (+0.354s).

Otherwise, Vinales and Trackhouse rider Miguel Oliveira (17ꦛth on Friday) have had a tougher time adapting to the higher downforce and revised bike balance of the ’24 Aprilia.

Espargaro, 34 and the oldest rider on the grid, admits he has an ‘ꦜold school’ body-on-the-bike riding style, rather than leaning far from the bike with his elbow down.

The triple MotoGP race winner has previously revealed that he often enjoys better acceleration than his RS-GP cꦜ💟olleagues, and was pressed again on what benef𝓡its hi𒆙s riding style offers.

“In the last two years with Romano [Albesiano], with the engineers, we tried to analyse the benefits and the negatives of riding like this. And it affects quite a lot t🌳he tyres. In some places it’s good. In others not that much,” Espargaro said.

“One really good guy we have in the team, not a technician, is [test rider] Matteo Biacocco. He's analysing eꦬverything, making videos [to compare riding styles]. So we talk a lot about this. And in a lot of points, I have a big advantage, more than what people thought.”

While the recent increase in MotoGP downforce was thought to be linked in some way to Espargaro’s rising performance, the reason why his style works so well on the latest aero-dripping machinesඣ was unclear.

“Nowadays you don't need to push that much the bike with your head [down low] on the floor because yo💧u have a lot of downforce, so 🍒the bikes are a lot easier to ride,” Espargaro explained.

“So if you move a little bit🌌 of weight in some places [by staying more on the bike], you stress a lot less the tyre. So it's not the most beautiful riding style for 🍨sure, but it's effective.”

But Espargaro wou🍌ldn’t go as far as to say o෴thers need to try and use a similar style.

“It's very difficult to say this…. I don't know. In the l🍨ast seasons, I have many ꩵstrong riders by my side.

“And yeah, you can say that I'm a really hard worker and wh𒅌atever you want, but at the end of the day, you need to go fast. And I'm really fast. And having this year, Raul and Miguelꦦ and Maverick - they are super talented.”

And you’ve often been the fastest…

“So it me👍ans my riding ꦇstyle is not that bad!” Espargaro smiled.