Assen (Holland), 27 June 2015 – The changes Aprilia brought to Assen were used both in practice and in the race, continuing development on the RS-GP. But after the good results obtained on Thursday and Friday a series of circumstances made the race difficult for both of the Aprilia Racing Team Gresini riders.
Straight away in the first lap contact between Barbera and Bautista took both riders out of the race and Bautista into the gravel. Alvaro re-entered at the rear of the pack, losing precious seconds, but from that point on he demonstrated an impressive pace which allowed him to catch up the group ahead of him and move up through the pack to 16th place. Just as it seemed that he would be able to make an attempt at a better position, Alvaro had the same chattering problem that had hampered progress in qualifying, forcing him to slow down and settle for a 17th place finish instead of a position that would have brought home championship points as he had done consistently in recent races. It was a difficult race for Melandri who finished 19th with a wide gap.
ROMANO ALBESIANO (Aprilia Racing Manager)
“Unfortunately in the race the chattering problem that we had unexpectedly in qualifying returned and that slowed Alvaro down. It’s a shame because he had already had a problem at the beginning in the first lap when he was knocked off track and despite losing a few seconds he re-entered lapping very well. It could have been a good race bit the problem got progressively worse and in the end Bautista had to slow down significantly.”
FAUSTO GRESINI (Team Manager)
“We didn’t bring home any points but we gained another valuable experience. As always the goal was to gather information that we can use in developing the bike and we did that, even if it turned out to be a complicated race, with contact at the beginning that forced Alvaro to lose a lot of ground. We were a bit unlucky but we still finished the race with both bikes. We’ll try to capitalize on the positive aspects and this is without a doubt one of them.”
ALVARO BAUTISTA
“I got off to a good start, gaining a few positions, but in the last turn a rider behind me hit me. I was forced to take a little off track excursion and I re-entered in last place. Then I maintained my pace and when I was starting to catch up the riders ahead of me, around 10 laps from the end, I started having a strong chattering problem at the front. The problem got worse every lap and by the end I was having a lot of difficulty in the turns. It’s a shame because we could have brought home points today. The weekend was positive in practice but then this problem with vibrations came up both in qualifying and in the race. Now we’ll try to figure out what is causing it so it doesn’t happen again in the future. During the weekend we also did a lot of good development work. The new swingarm provides a few advantages and we’ll continue to use it in the future.”
MARCO MELANDRI
“An excellent start but the usual chassis problems keep me from pushing hard. We’ll head to Germany hoping for some changes.”
