Fermin Aldeguer shows a strong finish in Spielberg and even puts Marc Marquez under pressure – but Marquez knows where the rookie was even better
MotoGP rookie Fermin Aldeguer (Gresini-Ducati) put in a strong comeback at the Austrian Grand Prix and even put season dominator Marc Marquez (Ducati) under pressure in the final stages. Aldeguer recorded his biggest gap in the 15th of 28 laps.
At that point, the 20-year-old was in fifth place, four seconds behind the leader. By the 24th lap, Aldeguer was just under a second behind Marquez. It wasn’t enough for an attack, but with second place, the Spaniard was the man of the race.
“It was one of the best races of my life,” Aldeguer beamed. “Everything went easily, I have to say. I don’t know why. In the first part of the race, I tried to overtake the other riders, and I managed it without any problems.”
“After overtaking Pedro, the gap to Marco was big. But my feeling got better and better with every lap. Sure, once I had overtaken him, the podium might not have been the best possible result today. I could have won the race!”
Aldeguer came out ahead of Marquez in one ranking, as international fans voted him Rider of the Day. He received 42 percent of the votes cast, while Marquez received 32 percent and Marco Bezzecchi 17 percent.
“Yes, that’s great, really special, because fighting against the eight-time world champion for the ‘Rider of the Day’ title is extremely difficult,” laughs Aldeguer. “But I’m the new generation, I’m young, and we have the advantage of sometimes being able to ride a race like this.”
Off the track, Marquez and Aldeguer get along very well. They sometimes train together in motocross in Spain. Marquez has given his younger compatriot lots of tips and advice since he started out in MotoGP.
Will Marc Marquez no longer be giving advice in the future?
Is it over after this race? “I mean, we have a very good relationship, but you can’t really help,” said Marquez. “You can give some advice, and we have a very good relationship between the three of us – me, Alex, and Fermin.”
“But at the end of the day, he has a very good team, he’s with Gresini, and they give him advice during the weekend. He’s having fun, he’s growing, and as we’ve seen in many races—I remember in Austin he was the fastest in the second half of the race.”
Aldeguer has taken over the crew at Gresini from Frankie Carchedi, who looked after Marquez last year. Marquez therefore knows this team very well. At Ducati, all the data is also open. Everyone can see what the other riders are doing.
“Marc doesn’t look at my data,” laughs Aldeguer. But Marquez responds: “No, but it’s true that this weekend, for example, or generally during all weekends, I only check my own data.”
“I don’t look at much, but I looked at his third sector – that’s the double left and only one right corner – and he was faster than me there. So I said: ‘He’s doing something special in the left-hand corners.’“
”I saw that he was carrying a lot of corner speed. With the tire we had this weekend, that was something you had to do. Because if you just drive stop-and-go, i.e. brake hard, swing the bike around and then accelerate, you don’t have that grip.”
“And that cornering speed helps him with this rear tire carcass to preserve the tire and maintain speed without putting too much strain on the tire. I tried to copy him a little in those two corners. The rest of the time I ride my own style.”
What Aldeguer wants to focus on now
We’ve seen Aldeguer get stronger in the second half of races this season, while other riders have had to slow down a bit. Is that a natural quality he has as a racer, as Marquez described?
“I don’t know,” Aldeguer shrugs. “That’s my style. I don’t do anything different from what I do at home or in free practice. I think it’s down to the speed I have in the middle of the corner, the way I use the throttle, because I ride very cleanly.”
“But I still need to work more on adapting my style to this bike in order to be more competitive on other tracks. But we are improving very quickly. I think my entire team and everyone at Ducati are really happy with how I’ve adapted so far.”
This second place in Spielberg was the best result in Aldeguer’s short MotoGP career so far, after Le Mans, where the weather was changeable. He is currently eighth in the World Championship after 13 race weekends.
What are his next goals? “One of the things I want to work on is the first part of the race. I want to practice more starts. I want to be at the front in the first lap to make the race easier. But yes, this season is about learning.”
