Francesco Bagnaia’s difficult 2025 MotoGP campaign may have taken a turn for the better after taking a good leap forward at the Grand Prix of Aragon.
Yet again, he finished as part of a double Marquez act on the podium, but wouldn’t have minded after a two-race absence from the podium for Ducati.
To be within three seconds of victory on a day without any chaos was a significant breakthrough and shows that Bagnaia hasn’t given up on a return to the front of the field just yet.
With 14 more rounds of the MotoGP season to go, perhaps he still harbours hopes of achieving what would be a very special third title in 2025.
It was a change of brakes that sparked an improvement at the Grand Prix of Aragon, giving him more feeling in the front of the bike and more confidence to push hard.
On an even better note, Bagnaia will be licking his lips at Ducati’s ‘new’ upgrades after they brought some additions to the second in-season test of the season on the Monday after Aragon.
Bagnaia’s ‘significant’ Ducati change may have fixed his issues, but he’ll need to replicate his improvements at other circuits too if he wants to sustain that form.
Francesco Bagnaia has finally stopped complaining about Ducati’s bike in Aragon
Bagnaia looked ‘sarcastic’ in Ducati’s garage after a tough start to the weekend. He looked resigned to another few days of struggle.
In fact, Ducati were ‘running out of patience’ with Bagnaia for his criticisms of the GP25 bike, which has enjoyed plenty of success with teammate Marc Marquez.
Now that he’s happier with the balance, he has issued a surprising update on the condition of his feelings after Aragon.
“The focus was on a new disguise. I don’t think we’ll use them in Mugello, because we need more time to be able to judge them,” he told SPEEDWEEK.
“But we were competitive with them and had them in use throughout the afternoon. Fortunately, we have Michele (Pirro) in Barcelona, who will do more kilometres there in the next few days with the new fairing.
“I myself was quite satisfied with it, but I think that we have to change the balance of the bike a bit. At the moment, however, I don’t want to change anything, but continue with my setup.”
Why Ducati may not have had the money to fix Francesco Bagnaia’s issues
A ‘miserable’ Bagnaia’s biggest problem at Ducati was with his front forks on the GP25 – a costly and time-consuming thing to replace.
It’s something that had changed over the winter, with slightly more of a restriction on the movement and steering from the newer piece.
Until Aragon, it hadn’t seemed possible to ride around the problem, but inroads have been made and perhaps it has become a manageable issue.
With further upgrades, the predicament may improve too. Bagnaia just has to remain optimistic that a solution is around the corner.
