Friday, April 26th - Practices
The European leg of the MotoGP tour officially begins with the Spanish Grand Prix.
The first session on Friday didn't yield remarkable results: David approached cautiously, avoiding errors while getting a feel for the track. Meanwhile, Matteo focused on fine-tuning the bike and increasing speed in preparation for the following sessions.
The second session saw significant improvement from both riders: Matteo still struggled a bit, needing to find the right setup, but managed to finish 15th, posting a better time than in the morning.
On the other hand, David debuted with competitiveness and demonstrated great speed, placing 5th for the moment, positioning himself directly into Q2.
Saturday, April 27th - Practices and Qualifying
The rain baptizes the first Saturday session, leading the riders to circulate on a wet track.
Matteo finds excellent confidence in these weather conditions, managing to finish the session with the 5th best time.
David decides not to take to the track to avoid excessive risks, knowing that his direct qualification to Q2 would not be jeopardized as no other rider would be able to improve on Friday afternoon's times.
The track begins to dry during the qualifying session, but there are still wet patches scattered around, making the situation quite challenging to manage.
Matteo's qualifying ends without access to Q2 by a whisker due to traffic preventing him from improving his time, placing 5th in the session and securing the 19th grid slot for the race.
The challenging conditions also affect David's performance in Q2; the home rider fails to stand out due to the conditions, finishing his qualifying in 16th position.
Sunday, April 28th - Race
The race starts uphill, with the aim of making a comeback.
With this determination, the riders find themselves in the same group, fighting for points from the early laps: David even manages to lead the group for several laps, while Matteo seems to struggle more, but both maintain a consistent pace throughout the race, never leaving the melee of the central group.
Matteo finishes the race with an overtaking move on David, allowing him to secure the 14th position.
David follows closely, finishing 15th and earning his first point of the debut season.
Team Comments
Team Manager, Mirko Cecchini, comments on the weekend's performance: "We had already seen from the tests that we were struggling more here compared to the KTM. Starting from behind certainly complicated everything, but we look ahead with confidence knowing that there will be tracks where performance can be much better."
Matteo is not satisfied with the performance, even though the first answers to doubts about the tires finally arrive: "It was a tough weekend because I couldn't perform as I wanted. I made a mistake at the start but still had the speed to stay with the second group, I felt good. I'm starting to understand tire wear, but despite that, I have to apologize to the team for the work done that didn't pay off, but we take it all as experience to improve!"
David considers himself satisfied after going through tough days due to the injury: "The race was a bit difficult, but the goal was to finish the race and we succeeded even though I suffered from hand pain lap after lap. Anyway, the goal was achieved and we will improve little by little! See you in Le Mans!"